Cibrarp  of  Che  Cheolocjieal  ^eromarp 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 

PRESENTED  BY 

The  Estate  of  the 

■» - — - -T  i -  15  T.T  • _ 3  J  _ _ ^ 

B  105  . H8  D52  1923 
Dickinson,  Charles  Henry, 

1857- 

The  religion  of  the  social 
passion  _ 


GEO  ,  PULLMAN, 

230  HICKORY, 

ELKHART,  {.NO. 


0 


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in  2019  with  funding  from 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary  Library 


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THE  RELIGION  OF  THE 
SOCIAL  PASSION 


THE  RELIGION  OF 
SOCIAL  PASSION 


MAR  23  F 


■ 


i  r  * 


By 


CHARLES  HENRY  DICKINSON 


Author  of 

“The  Christian  Reconstruction  of  Modern  Life” 


THE  CHRISTIAN  CENTURY  PRESS 

CHICAGO 


Copyright,  1923 

By  The  Christian  Century  Press 


To  the  Memory  of  My  Wife, 
MARY  LORD  THORN  DICKINSON 


7  planted  seeds  of  thought  in  many  soils, 

Designed  large  barns  and  spacious  threshing-floor : 
With  failure  of  each  harvest,  strove  the  more 
To  sow  swift  years  with  long,  incessant  toils: 

Lost  sowings!  Everywhere  the  rough  weed  foils 
The  seed's  brave  battle;  lifeless,  stripped,  and  hoar 
The  scant  stalks  droop ,  and  all  the  grain  they  bore 
Is  crushed  beneath  the  rank  vine's  snaky  coils. 

At  last  a  plot  I  found,  kept  rich  and  fair 
By  angels'  tears,  warmed  with  the  smile  of  God, 
For  perfect  harvest:  blooms  like  your  life's  prayer, 
Each  gracious  day,  more  holy  every  hour, 

There  where  I  flung  my  heart  beneath  the  clod, 

On  your  dear  grave,  love's  deathless  passion-flower. 


CONTENTS 


1.  INTRODUCTION. 

2.  THE  RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF 

THE  SOCIAL  PASSION. 

3.  THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST. 

4.  THE  HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION. 

5.  THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE. 

6.  MODERN  APPROACHES. 

7.  THE  RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION. 

8.  THE  IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION. 

9.  HUMANITY'S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE. 

10.  THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION. 


I 


INTRODUCTION 


Though  we  who  seek  should  never  find, 

Yet  will  tv e  count  the  search  the  best 

That  any  God  could  give:  unbind 

Thyself  for  the  ascent  beyond  yon  highest  crest. 


§  1 


OVE  to  men  may  weaken  faith  in  God.  The 


doubt  may  become  denial,  when  increasing  de¬ 


votion  to  the  human  finds  the  customary  con¬ 
ceptions  of  deity  inadequate  to  human  events,  human 
tasks,  human  demands  upon  life  and  their  successes 
and  disillusions.  The  world’s  recent  and  continuing 
tragedy  has  made  belief  in  God  more  difficult  to 
many  compassionate  hearts,  and  has  tended  to 
separate  from  conscious  faith  our  service  to  men. 

This  tendency  is  essentially  different  from  the 
agnosticism  from  which  it  inherits  the  rejection  of 
the  traditional  arguments  for  the  being  of  God. 
Agnosticism’s  closest  relations  were  with  physical 
science :  this  aversion  to  faith  is  derived  from  human 
sympathies  and  appreciations.  That  was  intellec¬ 
tual;  this  is  vital.  That  was  too  negative  to  be  an 
outright  denial ;  this  asserts  great  things.  That  re¬ 
pressed  and  confused ;  this  arouses  to  definite  tasks. 
Men  of  the  humanistic  temper,  if  they  can  no  longer 
pray,  will  work  the  harder.  The  spiritual  powers, 
which  had  been  directed  up  to  a  superhuman  being, 


11 


12  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

now  pour  themselves  out  for  realizations  of  human¬ 
ity. 

Here  the  suspicion  of  a  more  intimate  faith  begins 
to  dawn.  A  holy  mystery  greets  us,  not  from  super¬ 
human  heights,  nor  from  the  depths  of  the  lonely 
soul,  but  from  the  faces  of  our  fellows  and  may 
there  be  disclosed  as  able  to  subdue  all  things  to 
itself. 

§  2 

Any  general  impulse  among  men  produces 
a  movement  of  fundamental  thinking,  from  which 
in  turn  the  general  movement  may  gain  self-con¬ 
sciousness,  guidance,  and  inspiration.  Congenial 
to  the  human  devotion  of  our  day,  and  capable  of 
mutually  helpful  alliance  with  it,  is  the  philosophic 
humanism  which  occupies  an  increasing  number  of 
thinkers  in  many  lands.  The  light  of  their  search¬ 
ing  must  shine  down  upon  men  of  their  spirit,  who, 
sharing  their  quest,  pursue  it  by  methods  less  tech¬ 
nically  difficult. 

This  inquiry,  in  all  its  varieties,  is  absorbed  in 
human  life.  Its  purpose  is  not  to  achieve  an  intel¬ 
lectual  construction  of  the  universe,  nor  to  at¬ 
tain  truth  in  the  traditional  meaning  of  truth,  nor 
to  find  a  superhuman  God.  Whatever  it  encounters 
it  labors  to  subordinate  to  the  human,  to  center  in 
the  human.  Its  task  is  to  serve  the  vigor,  the  joy, 
the  accomplishment  of  human  life. 

Human  life  is  its  passion.  All  thought,  all  ethical 
principles,  all  spiritual  aspirations  are  for  this  self- 
achieving  human  life.  They  are  experimented  with 


INTRODUCTION 


13 


for  their  contribution  to  human  life.  By  this  coxv 
tribution  they  are  judged.  Truth  is  not  only  to  be 
sought  along  life’s  onward  way,  but  is  that  ad¬ 
vance.* 

In  this  ministry  to  human  life  the  humanistic 
thinker  is  forced  to  repudiate  another  service.  This 
philosophy  is  not  “handmaid  of  faith,”  if  the  object 
of  faith  is  a  superhuman  God.  Such  a  God  is  not 
in  all  its  thoughts.  The  human  is  its  realm,  and 
whatever  else  it  may  encounter  it  must  attempt  to 
subordinate  to  that.f  In  thought  and  in  work  no 
man  can  serve  two  masters.  We  cannot  serve  Goa 
and  man.  The  only  deity  that  the  humanist  can 
acknowledge  is  the  human  God,  if  there  be  such  a 
God.  The  only  way  to  seek  him  is  the  way  of  deep¬ 
ening  experience  of  the  human,  and  intensifying 
devotion  to  the  human. 

§  3 

Reverent  and  devoted  souls  who  doubt  God  be¬ 
cause  they  love  men,  and  who  cannot  serve  two 
masters,  God  and  man,  feel  the  desire  to  join  philo¬ 
sophic  humanism  in  its  great  adventure.  But  many 
of  them  are  unversed  in  the  technicalities  and  ex¬ 
tensive  references  which  even  humanistic  method 

*The  method  of  pragmatism  is  becoming  familiar  in  the  phrase, 
“D'oes  it  work?”  This  test,  simple  as  it  sounds,  is  vague,  almost 
meaningless,  except  as  clarified  in  humanism.  For  what  “does  it 
work  ?” 

fWhen  some  humanists  plead  that  faith  in  a  superhuman  God  Is 
recommended  by  the  assistance  which  this  postulate  may  render  to 
the  aims  of  human  life,  they  fail  to  reflect — among  other  considera¬ 
tions — that  human  life  would  then  be  turned  to  aims  outside  itself, 
even  to  those  of  a  superhuman  God.  Thus  the  task  of  humanism  is 
repudiated,  and  its  instruments  are  thrown  away.  Even  though 
this  God  be  thought  to  include  the  human,  and  though  human  aims 
be  embraced  in  him,  none  the  less  would  Buperhumanity  be 
decisive  of  thought  and  ltf». 


14  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

employs.  In  behalf  of  these  fellow-servants  of  the 
social  passion,  a  humbler  task  presents  itself,  de¬ 
rived  from  the  eminent  humanistic  thinkers  of  our 
day,  and  extensive  of  their  influence.  This  task  is : 
to  disclose  without  the  severity  of  their  processes, 
which  however  the  author  may  continually  keep  in 
mind,  clearer  meanings  of  the  humanity  we  serve 
and  of  the  impulse  to  serve  it.  ..  My  special  purpose 
is  to  interpret  this  insight  and  impulse  as  religious. 
In  humanity  I  seek  the  human  God.  My  unassum¬ 
ing  method  limits  itself  to  reflection  upon  a  selec¬ 
tion,  though  a  representative  selection,  of  the  facts 
of  human  life. 

The  attempt  has  its  difficulties,  as  great  in  their 
way  as  those  which  beset  the  technically  metaphy¬ 
sical  undertaking.  For  the  two  advances  are  in  the 
same  direction,  one  along  the  heights,  the  other  up 
the  valley.  Our  undistinguished  path  also  leads  into 
secular  affairs,  not  into  lonely  realms  of  meditation 
and  prayer,  where  we  have  been  bidden  to  seek  God ; 
not  into  the  wilderness  where  prophets  have  been 
wont  to  meet  the  Supreme,  but  into  men’s  working- 
places.  Or  if  we  climb  up  for  brief  intervals  into 
the  mountain  sanctuaries  of  nature  and  our  own 
hearts,  it  is  to  gain  a  vantage-ground  from  which 
to  survey  the  struggles  where  our  work  is  cast. 
Throngs  of  men  and  events  seem  strange  places  for 
seeking  God. 

With  recognition  of  its  perplexities  I  undertake 
a  part  in  the  humbler  task,  pledging  undivided  al¬ 
legiance  to  that  aggressive  humanism,  in  the  most 
broadly  human  sense  of  the  word,  which  I  have 


INTRODUCTION 


15 


accepted  because  it  seems  to  me  the  only  life  pos¬ 
sible  to  anyone  who  would  live  the  life  of  this  time. 
The  conviction  that  emboldens  me  in  a  religious 
quest  apparently  so  irreligious — a  conviction  which 
seems  to  me  to  be  reinforced  by  every  historic  spirit¬ 
ual  advance — is  this  :,  that  God  is  always  found  in 
service  to  men. 


II 


THE  RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  THE 

SOCIAL  PASSION 

In  presence  of  our  callousness  and  greed 
The  mangled  corpses  of  the  nations  bleed: 

Yet ,  human  hearts  that  love  all  men  as  men , 

From  your  warm  touch  the  dead  shall  live  again . 

-  §1 

WHEN  our  hearts  are  overwhelmed  by  the 
universal  sorrows  of  this  terrific  time, 
we  are  initiated  into  a  mighty  brother¬ 
hood  of  help.  The  toil  of  its  members,  however  per¬ 
plexed,  is  devoted  to  the  recovery  of  human  life, 
though  their  forecasts  may  be  dark  concerning  the 
outcome  of  the  world's  continuing  woe.  Their  war¬ 
fare  is  against  the  repression  of  men,  however  the 
battle  goes.  They  whose  hearts  humanity  has 
touched  are  a  great  host,  as  is  proved  by  each  one 
of  them  finding  many  companions.  There  are  also 
potential  allies,  obscurely  swayed  by  this  sympa¬ 
thetic  energy,  who  are  to  be  drawn  into  conscious 
unity.  And  there  is  recognizable  in  the  heart  of 
humanity  that  human  impulse  which  is  devotion  to 
humanity.  The  sharers  of  this  impulse  can  accept 
no  other,  however  imposing,  as  the  moving  spirit 
of  our  time.  It  is  important  that  the  companions 
of  the  social  passion  learn  the  historic  sources  of 
its  power,  and  the  secret  of  its  vitality,  that  we 

16 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  17 


may  the  better  serve  humanity  in  the  undaunted 
unity  of  loyal  souls. 

§2 

Because  of  such  a  fellowship  of  the  social  passion, 
our  time  may  be  entitled  an  epoch  of  humanism. 
The  word  is  indispensable  because  of  its  historic 
meaning.  The  social  passion  is  not  synonymous 
with  it,  ,but  is  its  consummation,  receiving  content 
from  the  various  developments  of  humanism.  This 
'  word  may  follow  other  once  unfamiliar  terms  of 
social  meaning  into  common  speech.  Its  connota¬ 
tions  are  not  to  be  limited  to  a  philosophic  doctrine, 
a  literary  movement,  or  a  method  of  education.  It 
unites  these  and  other  manifestations  into  a  univer¬ 
sal  interest.  It  rrieans  to  us  now  the  intensified 
resurgence  of  a  great  historic  energy.  It  connects 
us  with  previous  phases  now  revived.  It  has  been 
rapidly  forming  for  a  period  of  years.  Against  the 
materialism  of  an  epoch  of  physical  science,  which 
interrupted  the  historic  sweep  of  humanism,  social 
subjects  have  yet  pressed  to  the  front,  and  social 
interests  have  occupied  more  intensely  an  increas¬ 
ing  number.  The  world’s  agonies  have  that  to 
which  they  can  appeal,  and  rouse  into  a  consuming 
passion.  Humanism,  as  an  historic  process,  merges 
its  former  attainments  into  a  present  consciousness 
deeper  than  they.  As  historic,  it  is  prophetic  of 
conceptions  higher  still  than  ours. 

Anticipations  of  modern  humanism  are  to  be 
recognized  even  in  the  so-called  “ages  of  faith.” 
The  modest  request  was  submitted  that  there  might 
be  granted  to  some  human  powers,  which  were  sub- 


18  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

ject  to  religious  and  political  institutions,  not 
merely  an  indulgent  concession,  but  rather  a  recog¬ 
nition  of  their  independent  worth,  and  a  free  course 
for  their  development.  These  distinctively  human 
claims  consolidated  themselves  into  the  assertion 
of  the  freedom  of  life  for  human  ends,  which,  how¬ 
ever,  were  to  have  only  a  place  alongside  the  tradi¬ 
tional  dominations.  When  such  a  combination  was 
seen  to  be  impossible,  the  demand  became  inevitable 
that  the  human  should  be  dominant,  that  all  things 
should  be  subordinated  to  the  human,  centered  in 
the  human.  Humanism,  in  the  historic  develop¬ 
ment  of  its  meaning,  is  not  merely  the  pursuit  of 
human  interests  along  with  others — as  for  instance, 
the  glory  of  a  superhuman  God — though  in  this  re¬ 
striction  its  spirit  is  at  work.  Humanism  is  the 
conviction  that  all  things  must  be  subordinated  to 
the  human,  centered  in  the  human. 

If  we  who  are  humanists  still  explore  physical 
things,  it  is  not  that  we  may  be  enthralled  by  their 
greatness  and  complexity,  but  that  we  may  make 
them  instruments  of  human  self-realizations.  The 
only  sacredness  to  us  of  any  commandment  or  cus¬ 
tom,  of  church,  state,  family,  or  whatever,  is  the 
furtherance  of  the  human.  All  these,  like  the  Sab¬ 
bath,  were  made  for  man.  The  same  norm  is  ap¬ 
plied  to  religious  faith.  The  difficulty  has  already 
been  indicated,  of  persuading  the  humanist  to  faith 
in  a  superhuman  God.  Throughout  the  whole 
range  of  thought  and  action,  humanism  strives  to 
subordinate  all  to  the  human,  to  center  all  in  the 
human. 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  19 


He  serves  a  cause  loyally  who  appreciates  it  dis- 
criminatively.  We  form  unbiased  estimates  of 
humanism’s  various  manifestations,  the  lower  and 
the  higher,  in  order  that  we  may  learn  its  possibili¬ 
ties  of  realizable  good,  and  that  we  may  so  serve  it 
as  to  develop  its  intrinsic  excellence.  Such  study 
will  distinguish  humanism  from  other  character¬ 
istics  of  the  times  in  which  it  has  flourished,  even 
though  these  alien  qualities  attached  themselves 
to  it  so  closely  as  to  seem  to  belong  to  it.  These 
distinctions  may  acknowledge  the  imperfection  of 
humanism  in  every  stage  except  the  highest,  which 
v  is  the  object  of  our  quest.  Even  in  our  conception 
of  that  highest,  we  shall  be  able  to  discern  only 
approximations  to  the  inexhaustible  implicitness. 
Yet  humanism’s  impulse  toward  that  highest  is  dis¬ 
coverable  in  every  step  of  the  ascending  way. 

My  unpretentious  task  does  not  include  the  theo¬ 
retical  establishment  of  the  validity  of  humanism, 
nor  the  waging  of,  a  dialectical  warfare  against  its 
enemies.  We  are  humanists  because  we  are  con¬ 
strained  to  be.  The  qobler  practical  impulses  of 
these  tremendous  days  are  moving  one  way.  That 
way  is  no  longer  worldward  in  a  scientific  interest, 
nor  God-ward  in  a  distinctively  religious  awaken¬ 
ing,  but  manward  in  an  intensified  human  self- 
consciousness  and  social  passion.  Enemies  of  the 
good  are  no  longer  resisted  as  godless,  but  as 
inhuman. 

Though  there  are  no  final  proofs  that  a  stage  of 
humanity’s  growth  is  characterized  by  this  or  that 
impulse,  and  though  every  generation  must  leave 


20  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

to  later  times,  perhaps  distant,  to  conclude  what 
energy  of  itself  is  most  significant,  we  cannot  wait 
for  decisions  pronounced  over  our  graves.  If  we 
feel  a  passionate  endeavor  great  enough  to  enlist 
all  living  men,  if  our  nobler  tendencies  respond  to 
it,  and  if  we  may  learn  that  this  power  is  not  of 
today  nor  yesterday,  but  is  of  the  depths  of  the 
human  spirit  in  all  times,  and  has  been,  in  ever 
developing  forms,  the  moving  force  of  the  times 
that  appeal  to  our  vitalities  as  especially  worth  liv¬ 
ing  in,  why  seek  another  light  to  follow,  another 
life  to  live!  When  we  feel  a  power  that  concen¬ 
trates  our  devotion  and  assigns  our  task,  that  power 
we  serve. 

In  such  devoted  task  our  loyalty  must  be  given  to 
the  cause  entire,  universal,  and  to  its  elements  for 
the  sake  of  the  whole ;  not  to  some  separated  aspect, 
which  by  its  separateness  denies  the  good  that  all 
men  may  live  in  and  work  for.  Nor  must  our  par¬ 
ticipation  be  hindered  by  any  class  prerogative  or 
prejudice,  any  ecclesiastical  hesitancy,  any  cultural 
aloofness.  Even  the  spiritual  goods  that  have 
seemed  most  precious  must  be  held  subject  to  its 
demand,  lest  we  lose  the  human  fellowship  which 
is  for  us  a  more  vital  grace  than  they. 

To  an  increasing  brotherhood,  the  humanistic 
absorption,  developing  into  the  social  passion,  is  our 
time's  very  soul  and  self.  Those  who  are  isolated 
from  this  spirit  of  the  time  must  be  won  from  ^ 
death  to  life,  out  of  darkness  to  the  light  tha^ 
guides.  Only  those  who  have  given  themselves  to 
he  fused  and  refashioned  in  this  flame  can  suspect 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  21 


what  energies  it  contains,  to  what  august  duties  it 
impels,  to  what  high  enterprises  of  universal  good 
it  leads  on. 

Not  to  live  in  the  life  of  one’s  own  time  is  not  to 
live  at  all,  since  life  offers  itself  to  any  man  only 
in  that  phase  of  the  universal  life  which  demands 
his  action.  Great  leaders,  more  than  others,  are 
servants  of  their  generation,  directing  their  own 
age  along  its  directive  way  for  the  generations  fol¬ 
lowing.  When  a  flood  of  the  spirit  sweeps  through 
the  world,  that  man  perishes  who  does  not  embark 
upon  it,  unregretful  for  what  he  must  leave  behind, 
unconcerned  whither  he  may  be  borne. 

§3 

Humanism’s  religious  reservations  are  not  con¬ 
fined  to  the  denial  of  a  superhuman  God.  They 
recognize  the  same  repression  of  the  human  in  the 
acknowledgement  of  moral  law  as  transcendently 
absolute ;  or  of  ideas,  conceptions,  categories  as  sub¬ 
stantial.  Humanism  can  accept  none  of  the  forms 
of  the  deterministic  philosophy  of  the  absolute,  nor 
join  in  the  adoration  of  an  unintelligible  mystery, 
an  unknowable  that  may  do  to  us  we  know  not 
what.  The  repression  of  the  human  is  obvious  in 
the  doctrine  of  an  all-inclusive  mechanism,  con¬ 
ceived  as  superhuman,  but  not  supernatural.  What¬ 
ever  humanism’s  estimates  of  the  physical,  it  cannot 
yield  to  any  pessimism  that  impairs  the  worth  or 
dims  the  victory  of  the  human  soul. 

Humanism’s  contention  with  the  traditional 
Christianity  of  the  superhuman  God  is  especially 


22  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

in  evidence,  because  that  religion  is  the  most  pow¬ 
erful  of  its  competitors.  Whether  that  form  of 
Christianity  is  really  the  religion  of  Jesus,  whether 
the  superhuman  God  is  essential  to  Christianity,  is 
a  question  that  will  meet  us  much  later.  What  con¬ 
cerns  us  now  is  the  inquiry,  whether  humanism  has 
any  vital  power  and  satisfaction  which  can  stand 
against  what  is  offered  by  the  Christianity  of  the 
superhuman  God.  That  competitor  offers  men  a 
spiritual  life.  In  the  view  of  humanism  this  is  its 
highest  offer.  What  has  humanism  to  offer  as 
equivalent? 

The  conviction  that  all  things  must  be  subordi¬ 
nated  to  the  human  has  a  spirituality  of  its  own, 
which  can  at  least  be  brought  into  comparison  with 
the  spirituality  which  is  claimed  by  the  Christian¬ 
ity  of  the  superhuman  God.  We  may  explore  later 
the  length  and  breadth  and  depth  and  height  of  the 
spiritual  interpretation  of  humanism.  The  point 
now  urged  is  simply  that  men  of  spiritual  temper 
are  not  obliged  to  turn  away  from  humanism  at  the 
outset,  as  failing  to  offer  them  that  which  they  de¬ 
mand  supremely. 

The  spirituality  of  humanism  attempts  two 
achievements  by  whose  success  or  failure  it  must 
be  tested.  One  is  the  victory  over  the  world,  in  the 
meaning  of  the  great  word,  “I  have  overcome  the 
world.”  The  physical  order,  and  all  intrusions  into 
the  human,  this  spiritual  life  strives  either  to  repel 
or  to  subjugate.  In  and  from  and  against  the 
world,  humanity  must  achieve  the  one  thing 
precious,  its  own  soul.  The  second  attempt,  in- 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  23 


volved  in  the  first,  is  the  untrammeled  development 
of  those  qualities  which  are  recognized,  without 
elaborate  definition  at  this  point,  as  the  higher 
human  powers. 

A  large  class  of  inspirational  modern  writings 
may  be  recognized  as  humanistic  in  this  respect, 
that  they  are  mainly  occupied,  not  with  thoughts 
of  a  superhuman  deity,  but  with  aspirations  of 
humanity  toward  its  own  fulfillments  of  righteous¬ 
ness  and  love,  of  beauty  and  power.  Their  mention 
of  a  God  above  men,  if  occurring  at  all,  is  generally 
either  incidental  or  an  afterthought.  In  some 
great  prophets  of  the  spiritual  life  such  allusion 
fails  altogether,  with  no  evident  loss  of  conviction 
or  inspiration.  In  these  writers,  in  the  men  whom 
they  express,  and  in  those  to  whom  they  appeal, 
there  are  not  lacking  such  values  as  faith,  humility, 
contrition,  and  some  at  least  of  the  purifying  and 
strengthening  upiooks  of  prayer.  This  spirituality 
bids  us  penitently  to  bare  our  hearts  to  the  consum¬ 
ing  light  of  those  exalted  souls  in  whom  humanity 
has  been  consummately  revealed.  Unto  them  and 
the  human  heights  which  they  essayed  and  unto 
Jesus  above  them  all,  this  spiritual  life  aspires,  with 
deepest  sense  of  ill-desert,  and  with  transforming, 
regenerating  faith.  As  social  consciousness,  this 
spiritual  life  confesses  the  sin  of  the  world,  not  as 
committed  against  a  superhuman  deity,  but  as  out¬ 
rage  of  humanity  by  lust  and  greed,  by  insensibility 
and  hate.  This  sin  is  revealed  by  the  awful,  com¬ 
passionate  radiances  of  unselfish  lives.  Their  re¬ 
generating  forces  are  flung  into  the  whole  world’s 


24  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

life,  which,  in  every  compassionately  aspiring  heart, 
travails  in  pain  for  men’s  redemption.  The  aids 
to  the  spiritual  life  are  in  the  spiritual  life.  When 
the  human,  as  above  the  physical  and  against  the 
brutal,  becomes  all  in  all,  every  power  of  devoted 
service  in  which  men  lose  and  save  themselves  pours 
itself  out  to  the  development  of  this  spiritual  life  in 
mankind,  cultivating  all  things  that  belong  to 
man’s  spiritual  being.  This  spirituality  desires  to 
become  every  man’s  service  in  his  achieved  power 
and  opportunity  to  serve,  devoted  to  every  man, 
and  rendered  through  every  man  to  that  concrete 
unity  of  interblended  lives  which  is  named  human¬ 
ity.  This  spirituality  feels  no  need  of  a  super¬ 
human  God.  Such  a  deity,  the  humanist  thinks, 
would  suppress  the  spiritual  energies,  divert  the 
human  purpose. 

This  spirituality  has  none  of  the  aloofness  and 
other-worldliness  to  which  faith  in  the  superhuman 
has  so  often  inclined.  Its  victorious  unfoldings 
cannot  be  in  any  retirement  from  the  human,  which 
it  serves,  nor  from  the  inhuman,  which  it  resists  to 
the  uttermost.  The  spirit  reveals  and  vindicates 
itself  in  the  real  battle  against  the  world  and  the 
flesh,  which  strive  to  possess  the  life  of  humanity. 

The  spirituality  which  is  the  end  and  motive  of 
the  spiritually  human  devotion  does  not  denote 
anything  abstract,  conceptual.  Humanity  has  come 
to  mean  to  us  actual  men,  outraged  but  unsubdued, 
ravished  women  whose  souls  could  not  be  violated, 
little  children  lifting  up  imploring,  handless  arms. 
Humanity  means  to  us  the  victims  of  the  scimitar, 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  25 


starving  men,  men  who  die  of  pestilence — flesh- 
and-blood  human  beings  in  their  needs  and  rights 
and  capacities  of  pain  and  joy.  Nor  is  a  sum  of 
separate  individuals  meant.  Those  for  whom  we 
toil  are  one  with  us  who  toil  for  them.  All  men  are 
embraced  in  that  interblended  labor,  anguish, 
achievement,  which  in  the  most  concrete  sense  we 
call  humanity.  This  is  what  we  serve,  and  we  will 
not  suffer  any  superhuman  object  to  divert  to  itself 
any  part  of  that  devotion.  When  the  traditional  re¬ 
ligion  says,  as  is  so  constantly  being  said  in  defer¬ 
ence  to  the  increasing  social  passion,  “the  worship 
of  God  is  the  service  of  men,”  that  identification 
practically  ceases  to  be  the  religion  of  the  super¬ 
human.  For  the  object  of  our  service  occupies  our 
service,  and  our  service  occupies  us  altogether,  sub¬ 
ordinating  all  our  powers  to  the  service  of  men, 
centering  all  in  the  service  of  men.  If  this  is  sin 
against  the  highest,  such  sin  becomes  indistinct  in 
comparison  with  enormities  committed  against 
men,  women  and  children,  so  unified  by  suffering 
into  one  palpitating  life  that  all  the  atrocities  out¬ 
rage  every  heart  that  feels,  violate  the  human  worth 
of  every  soul  that  has  not  renounced  humanity. 

Nor  do  we  have  to  ask  a  superhuman  being  for 
greater  powers  than  we  ourselves  possess.  Against 
powers  subject  to  waste  we  contend  by  spiritual 
energies  which  continually  renew  themselves.  They 
include  immortal  impulses  from  the  spiritual  strug¬ 
gles  of  humanity.  They  are  the  purified  aspirations 
of  every  age  and  clime,  thoughts  which  demanded 
truth,  magnanimous  arousings  of  men's  true  selves, 


26  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

solemn  wraths  against  oppression,  lowly  self-sacri¬ 
fices.  These  are  the  spiritual  weapons  of  our  war¬ 
fare  in  humanity’s  great  name. 

But  humanism  ventures  a  more  democratic  test 
of  its  spirituality  than  the  heights  of  humanity’s 
finest  souls.  The  value  of  a  principle  is  in  its  appli¬ 
cation  to  the  common  life  of  common  men. 

The  final  test  of  spirituality  is  willingness  to  lay 
down  one’s  life.  By  that  self-sacrifice  the  soul  wins 
its  final  victory  over  the  world,  and  attains  itself. 
This  devotion  is  continually  exemplified  by  common 
men,  with  the  faults  and  grossnesses  of  common 
men,  and  in  peace  as  well  as  in  war.  Motherhood 
is  that.  A  man’s  fundamental  claim  to  manhood  is 
his  readiness  to  fling  his  life  in  the  way  of  danger 
which  assails  those  for  whom  he  is  responsible,  and 
to  fulfill  a  trust  through  death  if  need  be.  But  in 
nearly  all  instances  the  object  of  the  devotion  is 
human.  The  noble  army  of  martyrs  for  God  is 
small  in  comparison  with  the  great  host  of  martyrs 
for  men.  From  this  host  is  excluded  those  who 
gamble  life  for  material  goods  for  themselves :  they 
have  no  connection  with  spiritual  self-devotion.  In 
that  devotion  the  powers  enlisted  are  humanistic 
powers.  If  religion  sometimes  cooperates — as  re¬ 
ligion  is  commonly  understood — that  assistance  ap¬ 
pears  unnecessary,  for  life  is  given  with  equal  read¬ 
iness  by  the  religious  and  by  the  irreligious  man. 
It  is  the  task  of  humanism  to  extend  this  essential 
of  human  life  to  all  human  activities,  so  that  men 
may  enduringly  live  as  they  willingly  die.  Neither 
in  the  development  nor  the  consummation,  any 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  27 

more  than  in  the  source  of  this  spiritual  potency, 
does  there  appear  the  need  of  a  superhuman  God. 

The  value  of  a  spirituality  without  this  encum¬ 
brance  was  never  more  evident  than  now.  The  ever 
unanswered  complaint,  “Why  is  the  Almighty  neu¬ 
tral  !”  speaks  out  of  the  world’s  heart  with  the  voice 
of  the  millions  and  millions  of  young  men  slain,  or 
suffering  mutilations  or  incapacities  harder  to  be 
endured  than  death,  and  with  the  lamentations  of 
those  whom  they  have  left  desolate;  with  the  cry 
of  millions  and  millions  of  women  and  children  and 
old  men  devastated,  starved,  massacred,  tortured, 
outraged ;  and  with  the  moan  of  nations  in  intermi¬ 
nable  suffering.  Finding  still  no  answer,  the  bitter 
complaint  continually  forms  the  denial  of  almighty 
God.  What  faith  is  left  to  those  who  face  the  in¬ 
sensibility  of  omnipotence,  unless  there  be  faith  in 
the  possibilities  of  the  human  soul? 

The  church,  which  represents  religion  or  is  the 
test  of  religion  to  many  millions,  is  especially  in 
her  recent  history,  a  witness  to  humanism ;  both  in 
her  failure,  and  in  whatever  success  she  has  won 
back :  since  the  latter  is  largely  due  to  her  borrow¬ 
ings  from  that  spirituality  which  subordinates  all 
things  to  the  human. 

It  is  a  discredited  church  that  emerges  from  the 
world  war,  forced  into  futile  apologies.  Against 
hell’s  outbreak  she  was  as  helpless  as  diplomacy. 
The  churches  of  the  central  powers  shared  the  ig¬ 
nominy  of  their  masters,  who  were  permitted  to  sit 
in  the  Master’s  place.  The  churches  of  the  neutral 
nations  were  neutral  churches,  with  a  neutrality 


28  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

whose  motives  were  not  derived  from  the  Sermon 
on  the  Mount.  The  Greek  church,  an  inefficient 
shepherd,  is  passing  with  her  flock  through  the  val¬ 
ley  of  the  shadow  of  death.  May  she  win  through 
to  a  table  prepared  in  the  presence  of  her  enemies! 
The  Roman  Catholic  church  was  shamed  by  the 
time-serving  of  the  Vatican. 

Where  the  church  has  retained  some  influence  and 
is  having  A  measure  of  success  in  re-establishing 
herself,  it  is  because  of  the  infusion  of  humanism. 
We  pay  our  homage  to  Mercier  and  to  those  faithful 
churchmen  of  whom  he  is  the  foremost,  not  because 
of  their  churchly  piety,  but  because  they  cham¬ 
pioned  human  interests,  devoted  themselves  to 
human  needs.  But  they  receive  no  greater  honor 
than  unbelievers  who  were  no  less  faithful  to  the 
cause  of  man.  The  service  of  many  churches  of 
every  divergency,  with  whom  must  be  honorably 
associated  Jewish  synagogues,  is  recognized  because 
they  sent  forth  healing  mercy,  with  billions  of  sacri¬ 
ficial  wealth  in  their  hands.  The  spirit  of  these 
churches — representing  also  their  non-Christian 
sisters — in  the  world  war  and  since,  seems  not  to 
be  distinctively  religious,  but  intensely  humanitar¬ 
ian.  Yet  the  members  of  the  church  are  equaled  in 
their  consecration  by  men  and  women  who  acknowl¬ 
edge  no  allegiance  to  her;  just  as  among  the  faith¬ 
ful  who  laid  down  their  lives,  no  difference  in 
devotion  appears  between  those  who  confessed  and 
those  who  denied  faith  in  God.  The  human  has 
become  for  the  church,  as  for  her  secular  partners 
in  ministry,  the  evident  source  of  power.  A  dis- 


RELIGIOUS  RESERVATIONS  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  29 


tinetively  religious  basis  seems  not  to  be  necessary. 
The  church  is  now  estimated  by  her  service  to 
human  interests.  By  this  service  her  own  children 
judge  her.  When  she  succeeds,  it  is  because  these 
interests  rind  her  useful.  In  separation  from  them 
she  languishes.  When  she  sets  herself  and  her  re¬ 
ligion  above  them,  she  declines.  Humanism  is 
supreme  even  in  the  house  of  God.  The  reflection 
is  obvious :  what  need  has  the  sufficient  human  im¬ 
pulse  to  seek  a  reinforcement  outside  itself?  The 
powers  by  which  we  overcome  are  ideal  and  spirit¬ 
ual  :  they  are  ideally  and  spiritually  human. 

But,  it  may  be  challenged,  does  not  spiritual 
humanism  lead  us  back  to  a  superhuman  God  who 
is  its  cause  or  ground?  Certainly  it  is  the  duty, 
not  only  of  metaphysicians,  but  also  of  all  other 
earnest  men,  to  seek  the  ground  and  source  and 
farthest-reaching  significance  of  this  devotion  and 
of  all  that  is  related  to  it  and  consummated  in  it, 
that  we  may  interpret  the  significance  of  spiritual 
manhood.  What  may  be  the  essential  significance 
of  this  spiritual  life,  I  have  hardly  intimated.  But 
it  is  evident  that  to  prove  the  superhuman  origin  of 
the  human  is  a  task  beset  with  grave  difficulties. 
Are  they  not  insurmountable?  As  the  attempt  to 
reason  from  the  physical  world  to  a  supernatural 
cause  of  it  has  been  abandoned  by  many  thinkers, 
who  have  found  that  no  such  argument  could  extri¬ 
cate  them  from  the  physical  itself,  so  it  is  likely  to 
be  with  the  attempt  to  derive  the  spiritual  human 
from  anything  above  the  human  spirit.  More 
promising  would  seem  an  attempt  to  account  for  the 


30  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

human  by  searching*  its  own  inmost  being. 

Thus,  against  high  appeals  of  faith  in  a  super¬ 
human  God  humanism  asserts  a  spirituality  of  its 
own,  which  is  consistent  with  the  conviction  that  all 
things  must  be  subordinated  to  the  human,  centered 
in  the  human.  No  humanistic  response  is  felt  to 
the  prevalent  vulgar  religion,  whose  interest  is  be¬ 
neath  the  genuine  human — the  religion  which  de¬ 
pends  upon  a  supernatural  deity  to  exploit  for  us 
the  world  of  flesh  and  sense.  Against  both  the 
lower  and  the  higher  faith  in  a  superhuman  God, 
humanism  asserts  the  human  values  which  are  en¬ 
trusted  to  it,  and  which  it  cannot  surrender,  imperil, 
nor  compromise. 

Does  humanism  then  issue  in  a  nobler  and  gentler 
atheism?  That  its  history  has  frequently  shown 
atheistic  tendencies,  no  student  of  it  can  deny.  But 
its  highest  developments,  though  they  may  seem  to 
consummate  the  opposite  of  a  religious  conscious¬ 
ness,  have  so  many  resemblances  to  spiritual  Chris¬ 
tianity  that  humanism  may  possibly  become  the 
interpreter  of  the  Christian  faith.  Though  human¬ 
ists  cannot  yield  their  conviction  of  the  supremacy 
of  the  human,  yet  they  must  both  claim  and  consider 
this:  thaiuthrough  all  ages,  assertions  of  the  best 
and  strongest  human,  which  shame  away  unworthy 
thoughts  of  the  divine,  have  pressed  on  to  more  vital 
affirmations  of  more  intimate  fellowships  with  God. 


Ill 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 

When  kneeling  at  the  tempter's  feet ,  to  gain 
At  that  small  price  the  world ,  our  heart's  desire , 
His  hand  upon  us  was  infernal  fire: 

No  harm  has  followed;  senses  still  remain 
To  gorge  his  gifts — only  our  souls  were  slain. 

§1 

GOD,  man,  world:  in  this  order  a  clarified 
religious  consciousness  ranks  the  three  con¬ 
stituents  of  the  universe,  the  bewilderingly 
interfused  trinity  of  all  that  is.  In  a  spiritual  esti¬ 
mate,  man  does  not  stand  between  “stars  above” 
and  “graves  below,”  but  all  that  is  not  God,  from 
stars  to  graves,  is  lower  than  he.  How  necessary, 
then,  seems  a  supernatural  and  superhuman  power, 
to  beat  back  the  physical,  whose  iron  hands  would 
drag  us  down  to  the  extinction  of  the  human  in  the 
physical !  But  humanism  stations  man  on  this  ver¬ 
tiginous  brink  unsecured  from  above. 

In  two  important  phases  of  modern  humanism, 
the  inevitable  task  of  maintaining  the  human 
against  the  physical  was  too  arduous.  In  the  ren¬ 
aissance,  nature  suddenly  disclosed  itself  as  an 
enormous  suppression.  The  repressive  historic 
events  along  which  we  trace  the  decline  of  the  ren¬ 
aissance,  even  through  glorious  transmissions 
from  land  to  land,  were  reinforced  by  the  annihilat- 


31 


32  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

in g  comparison  between  the  newly  discovered  great¬ 
ness  of  the  universe  and  the  littleness  of  man.  To 
a  later  phase,  the  physical  world  seemed  to  offer 
itself  as  willing  servant,  but  it  soon  unmasked  a 
destructive  enmity. 

§2 

Man’s  modern  rediscovery  of  himself  had  been 
but  just  attained,  when  it  was  followed  by  the  first 
discovery  of  the  physical  universe;  for  when  men 
learned  that  their  world  is  not  central,  they  first 
beheld  sun  and  stars.  Fortunate  for  the  original 
Hellenic  humanism  was  its  unsuspicion  of  the  ex¬ 
tent  of  the  physical.  Though  the  Greeks  forged 
science’s  mathematical  key,  they  tried  it  upon  few 
locks.  To  them,  no  less  than  to  the  unscientific 
Semite,  the  heavenly  bodies  were  “appointed  for 
signs  and  for  seasons,  and  for  days  and  for  years, 
and  to  give  light  upon  the  earth.”  It  was  favorable 
for  the  renaissance  that  the  irruption  of  the  new 
astronomy  was  subsequent  to  the  discovery  of  the 
new  lands.  This  expansion  of  the  earthly  habita¬ 
tion  was  an  inspiring  challenge  to  the  aroused  hu¬ 
man,  a  new  world  for  mankind  to  conquer,  with 
accompanying  victories  over  many  fettering  tradi¬ 
tions.  But  by  what  invasion  may  the  nebulae  be 
annexed !  What  winds  shall  waft  our  galleons 
across  the  shoreless  seas!  Might  not  science  at¬ 
tempt  the  voyage?  But  for  every  league  traversed, 
light-years  stretched  away. 

Discoveries  in  the  physical  world,  even  when  we 
consider  them  apart  from  resultant  inventions 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


33 


which  change  human  conditions,  may  affect  the 
thought  and  life  of  men  no  less  evidently  than  do 
events  called  epoch-making,  or  marked  advances  m 
culture  or  spirituality.  Witness  the  consequences 
of  geology  and  evolutionary  method  upon  popular 
thought  and  faith  and  aim.  But  the  discovery  of 
the  physical  universe  was  more  revolutionary  than 
the  discovery  of  anything  in  the  physical  universe. 
Men  saw  their  world  dashed  to  pieces,  and  the  crea¬ 
tion  of  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth.  For  earth, 
annexed  by  the  physical  universe,  joined  forces  with 
it  against  men.  Even  those  comprehensions  of  the 
physical  which  had  formerly  seemed  attainable  be¬ 
came  transcendent  of  human  powers.  Problems 
which  appeared  practicable  on  the  scale  of  this 
planet,  and  which  might  be  hopefully  reessayed 
even  when  each  successive  answer  proved  inade¬ 
quate,  were  found  to  involve  innumerable  unknown 
quantities.  Though  the  popular  knowledge  of  the 
vast  expansion  was  limited  by  the  illiteracy  of  the 
time,  yet  the  sharers  of  humanism  knew  it,  to  whom 
the  life  of  the  renaissance  had  been  committed. 
And  they  who  had  felt  themselves  sufficient  to  sub¬ 
due  the  world  saw  their  diminished  province  taken 
from  them,  beneath  the  unregarding  stars. 

A  great  recovered  heritage  of  Hellenism  turned 
against  the  children  of  the  renaissance.  The  Greek, 
in  his  clear  determination  to  subordinate  all  things 
to  the  human,  had  learned  to  weigh  and  measure 
physical  things.  Our  physical  science  is  mathemat¬ 
ical  because  of  him.  When  we  criticize  the  limita¬ 
tions  of  his  scientific  achievements,  it  is  well  to  ask 


34  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

whether  this  achievement  of  scientific  method  does 
not  reveal  more  genius  than  all  the  discoveries  to 
which  it  has  been  light-bearer.  The  Greek’s  use  of 
his  method  was  limited  because,  for  one  important 
reason,  humanity  was  his  passion,  and  things  were 
studied  only  as  they  might  be  made  to  serve  the 
humanistic  aim.  Mathematics  meant  more  to  him 
as  an  intellectual  power  than  as  an  introduction  to 
external  reality.  But  when  the  physical  realm  sud¬ 
denly  became  enormous,  the  inherited  mathematical 
procedure  laid  an  enormous  weight  upon  the  human 
soul.  Into  consciousness  was  thrust  the  mechanism 
of  undeviating  mathematical  process.  The  over¬ 
whelming  of  men  by  the  physical  so  conceived  im¬ 
poses  upon  them,  if  not  always  a  mechanical  inter¬ 
pretation  of  themselves,  yet  at  least  a  shrinking  in 
the  estimates  of  human  worth,  a  fatal  limitation  of 
the  assertion  of  spiritual  freedom,  and  a  directing 
of  human  life  away  from  development  of  soul. 

Institutional  restrictions  upon  religious  and  po¬ 
litical  freedom,  as  in  the  Roman  Catholic  revival, 
the  Protestant  state  churches,  and  the  consolida¬ 
tions  of  monarchy,  were  reinforced  by  the  accumu¬ 
lating  pressure  of  the  physical  universe.  As  primi¬ 
tive  people  feel  the  human  weakness  before  tiger 
and  serpent,  and  their  helplessness  in  the  face  of 
drought  and  pestilence,  so  men  of  a  developed  civi¬ 
lization  cowered  in  the  presence  of  the  immense 
antagonist.  The  wraiths  of  necessity  and  fate 
which  had  haunted  classic  humanism  became  immi¬ 
nent  realities.  As  the  panic-stricken  savage  betakes 
himself  to  his  wizard,  and  enchains  himself  to  cus- 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


35 


tom  and  its  custodians,  so  the  freedom  of  the  renais¬ 
sance  relapsed  toward  priest  and  king,  while  defi¬ 
cient  in  vital  faith  and  steadfast  loyalty. 

The  decadent  renaissance  sank  into  the  age 
of  the  enlightenment,  which  soberly  inventoried 
achievements  and  limitations.  This  epoch  was  the 
humiliated  soul's  awakening  to  the  actual.  Neces¬ 
sary  tasks  were  then  accomplished  or  begun,  for 
which  the  impatient  temper  of  the  renaissance  was 
less  competent.  But  it  was  a  dreary  time,  both  for 
those  who  accepted  it  and  for  those  who  strove, 
with  imperfect  success,  to  break  away.  Most  men 
found  a  place  to  live  in  and  to  enlarge  a  little. 
Such  adaptation  is  surrender  of  life’s  essential 
claims.  This  is  the  pusillanimity  which  is  content 
with  aggressions  over  other  powers  than  the  op¬ 
pressor  it  dares  not  face.  This  is  satisfaction  with 
inferior  activities,  while  the  chief  internal  energy 
lies  dormant.  As  from  a  deep  and  narrow  gorge, 
men  see  the  stars  as  indeed  above  them,  but  are 
enclosed  from  approach  or  vision  of  the  slopes  of 
Parnassus  and  the  heights  of  Calvary. 

In  our  own  experience,  the  immeasurable  spaces 
have  allied  with  themselves  against  us  the  inter¬ 
minable  times.  Our  earth,  in  whose  duration  the 
whole  stretch  of  human  history  is  a  brief  incident, 
is  as  a  single  emanation  of  energy  flung  into  the 
accumulated  forces  of  the  eons,  to  be  swallowed  up 
in  them ;  and  before  and  after  its  momentary  exist¬ 
ence,  the  eternal  heavens  organize,  perdure,  disinte¬ 
grate,  regather,  from  renewals  and  to  issuings  for 
which  our  mathematics  has  no  comprehensible  sym- 


36  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

bol.  The  physical  universe  has  not  even  scorn  for 
us.  What  we  resentfully  fancy  to  be  its  mocking 
voices  are  only  echoes,  from  impenetrable  walls,  of 
our  sorry  laughter  against  ourselves. 

§3 

Humanism,  preferring  its  own  spirituality  to 
that  which  is  offered  by  the  religion  of  the  super¬ 
human  God,  may  yet  feel  a  human  sympathy  for 
that  religion’s  attempt  to  escape  the  immense  physi¬ 
cal  antagonist.  The  most  common  faith,  commend¬ 
ing  itself  because  it  is  common,  is  that  which  goes 
out  to  the  imagined  mightier  than  the  might  of 
physical  things;  even  to  him  who  is  supposed  to 
have  created  them,  to  rule  them,  to  be  our  defense 
against  them,  our  refuge  from  them.  Was  it  not 
their  oppression  which  drove  men  to  faith  in  the 
omnipotent  helper?  But  humanists  and  many 
others  see  difficulties  in  this  faith.  The  argument 
is  long,  but  the  chief  objection  can  be  stated  briefly. 

Many  thinkers  find  no  way  from  the  physical 
universe — or  from  the  universe  in  its  physical  as¬ 
pect — to  a  power  that  governs  it.  Tracing  it  back, 
they  find  no  creator.  Tracing  it  outward  and  in¬ 
ward,  they  never  pass  beyond  its  own  properties 
and  procedures.  Tracing  it  on,  it  grinds  out  no 
rational  values.  They  do  not  rise  from  nature  in 
this  sense  to  nature’s  God. 

There  is  no  affirmation  here,  these  thinkers  judge, 
of  a  superhuman  and  supernatural  God;  but  how 
terrible,  overwhelming,  implacable,  are  the  denials! 
Jehovah,  no  more  than  Baal,  answers  from  heaven 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


37 


by  fire.  Never  in  man’s  conflict  against  his  enemies 
does  the  sun  stand  still  upon  Gibeon.  When  we 
pray  for  any  adaptation  of  the  physical  to  our 
heart’s  desire,  to  a  God  supposed  to  rule  the  physi¬ 
cal — however  earnestly  we  seek,  we  do  not  find, 
however  importunately  we  knock,  it  is  not  opened. 
Imaginings  of  favorable  response  reduce  to  some¬ 
thing  different,  shrink  away  before  the  innumer¬ 
able  disregardings,  and  before  the  growing  recog¬ 
nition  that  deviations  of  the  physical  order  are 
never  to  be  expected,  never  to  be  asked  for. 

How  the  human  may  overcome  can  be  told  only 
after  we  have  explored  the  powers  which  the  human 
contains.  At  this  point  we  can  only  say  that  the 
spirituality  of  humanism  seems,  even  at  this  outset 
of  our  reflection  upon  it,  to  be  an  essentially  better 
thing  than  dependence  upon  the  superhuman  deity 
of  the  physical  universe.  To  rely  upon  a  super¬ 
human  God  to  guard  us  from  physical  evils  and  to 
exploit  for  us  physical  goods,  and  to  rely  upon  our¬ 
selves  for  such  necessities  while  we  attain  ourselves 
by  learning  and  subduing  some  part  of  the  actual — 
these  two  impulses  seem  to  many  practical  people 
to  be  mutually  exclusive.  The  twain  are  often  seen 
together,  but  the  closer  the  juxtapositions,  the 
sharper  appear  the  mutual  antagonisms.  Nor  is  it 
enough  for  the  human  to  do  but  a  part  of  the  work. 
There  never  comes  the  moment  in  our  task  when 
we  can  say:  Now  we  have  done  our  utmost;  now 
we  will  stand  still  and  wait  for  almighty  God.  The 
resistance  of  Chateau  Thierry  advances  into  the 
offensive  of  Argonne  Forest.  There  are  always 


38  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

human  potencies  still  to  be  aroused.  We  are  not 
insensible  to  the  pathos  of  appeals  to  heaven  of  the 
sick,  the  famishing,  those  for  whom  reality  is  too 
stern.  But  it  is  humanity  that  hears  these  prayers 
and  answers  them.  Our  responsive  compassion 
toils  to  relieve  the  sufferers  by  serviceable  efficiency. 
And  we  teach  them  to  practice  the  same  deliverance 
upon  themselves  and  others.  When  the  great 
human  cause  is  assailed,  humanism  does  not  expect 
the  stars  in  their  courses  to  fight  against  Sisera. 
It  esteems  the  real  victory  to  be  the  energizings  of 
the  supreme  human  qualities. 

§4 

From  the  tyranny  of  the  immense  antagonist  an 
aesthetic  way  of  escape  has  been  attempted.  This 
path  is  for  the  few;  or  if  for  more,  it  is  accessible 
to  them  only  in  exalted  hours  of  dimly  felt  respon¬ 
siveness  to  nature,  or  is  all  but  unconscious  in  the 
early  years  of  a  natural  life  not  yet  disillusioned. 
Poets,  including  the  inarticulate,  artists  and  musi¬ 
cians,  including  those  to  whom  has  been  granted 
insight  but  not  expression,  accept  the  citizenship 
of  the  illimitable.  The  stars  may  seem  no  less 
friendly  than  when  men  hailed  them  long  ago  as 
radiant  divine-human  companions.  They  invite 
our  love,  which  would  win  their  responsive  love  to 
us;  as  earthly  echoes  of  crag  and  woodland  add  to 
our  returning  voices  the  antistrophes  of  the  spirits 
of  mountain  and  forest.  The  soul  may  feel  itself 
one  with  the  distant  in  time.  The  fossil  shell  on  a 
mountain  top,  touched  by  our  pulsating  fingers, 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


39 


beats  with  the  same  life  that  is  in  our  veins.  Nor 
can  that  vital  impulse  greet  us  from  so  far  back, 
even  from  other  worlds  than  ours,  as  to  be  alien. 
All  nature  may  hold  such  converse  with  us  that  we 
may,  in  the  pregnant  phrase  of  Jesus,  “know  all  the 
parables.”  These  recognizations  are  not  mere  fan¬ 
cies.  Fancy's  task  is  to  give  them  habitation  and 
name. 

These  attainments  demand  an  insight  that  is  dif¬ 
ferent  from  merely  sensuous  stimulation,  shallow 
aestheticism,  “pathetic  fallacy,"  or  overwrought 
rhapsody.  The  sentimentalist  of  the  pleasurable 
impression  produced  by  the  spangled  firmament 
deserved  Carlyle’s  rejoinder,  “Hoot,  mon,  it's  tur- 
rible."  Nature  is  truly  responsive  only  to  intense 
personal  and  social  consciousness.  This  is  Words¬ 
worth's  tenderly  august  message. 

This  fellowship  is  congenial  to  the  stronger  and 
finer  developments  of  humanism.  It  is  consistent, 
with  humanism  that  the  aesthetic  reconciliation  with 
nature  does  not  ask  the  interposition  of  a  God 
above  us,  but  is  the  arousing  of  our  own  spiritual 
life.  The  desired  issue  is  other  than  that  of  the 
thunderous  finale  of  the  drama  of  Job,  when  the 
hero  is  overwhelmed  by  the  outflamings  in  nature 
of  that  inscrutable  power  before  which  he  must 
abase  himself.  The  secret  of  the  universe,  as 
aesthetic  humanism  presages  it,  is  not  superhuman 
and  supernatural,  not  a  God  separate  from  our¬ 
selves  and  from  nature  reconciled  to  the  human 
soul. 

Yet  even  where  there  is  true  aesthetic  insight, 


40  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

rising  into  revelations  of  interpretive  expression, 
art  is  far  from  attaining  the  solution  of  the  prob¬ 
lem  of  ourselves  and  the  universe.  Those  who  seek 
here  the  reconciliation  of  the  physical  with  the 
human  spirit  seem  to  be  persuading  themselves  by 
excluding  repellent  aspects  of  nature  and  impera¬ 
tive  demands  of  life.  The  aesthetic  impulse,  as  they 
cultivate  it,  is  but  one  power  of  the  human  soul ;  or 
rather  it  attains  completeness  only  when  it  is 
blended  with  all  our  powers  and  with  all  of  life’s 
experiences.  Such  a  synthesis  will  be  attempted 
later.  It  may  be  said  that  the  aesthetic  is  not  able, 
in  isolation,  to  save  the  human  from  the  immense 
antagonist.  No  less  germane  to  it  than  its  congen¬ 
iality  with  nature,  is  the  consciousness  of  limitation 
and  defeat  as  we  confront  nature.  Its  most  poign¬ 
ant  expression  may  be  the  death-song  of  the  spirit, 
delivering  itself  up  to  be  absorbed  by  that  mystery. 
The  spirit  in  its  completeness  must  overcome  the 
world.  To  that  task  our  most  winged  potency  is 
insufficient.  Art  is  prophecy,  not  accomplishment; 
reconnoissance,  not  army  of  occupation;  no  final 
conqueror  of  the  physical  universe  in  every  aspect, 
by  the  human  soul  in  every  power. 

§5 

A  supernatural  and  superhuman  God  to  save  us 
from  the  world  which  overwhelms  us  is  not  acces¬ 
sible  to  humanism.  As  unacceptable  are  invitations 
to  yield  ourselves  to  the  great  all  of  things.  Yet 
these  suggestions  may  awaken  in  men’s  hearts  a 
supposition  preposterous  at  first  thought,  but  in- 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


41 


creasingly  insistent.  What  if  the  spaces  and  times 
image  forth  the  greatness  of  the  human  spirit,  and 
summon  us  to  spiritual  expansions  of  which  their 
immensity  is  a  symbol  ?  Not  into  individual  limita¬ 
tions  can  such  a  thought  be  received.  It  involves 
th  affirmation  of  the  social  nature  of  each  man’s 
essential  life.  Every  personal  power  and  worth 
grows  from  more  to  more  when  opened  to  human¬ 
ity’s  life  and  pouring  itself  out  thither.  We  cannot 
limit  the  range  of  this  humanity.  As  a  hermit 
nation  opens  itself  to  other  nations,  and  as  a  se¬ 
cluded  race  learns  that  other  races  are  of  the  same 
blood,  why  may  not  our  world  of  men  extend  itself 
into  other  realms?  Is  death  perhaps  the  initiation 
into  this  enlargement  of  humanity?  And  will  that 
initiation  be  necessary  for  the  mankind  of  riper 
ages?  The  sights  of  earth  and  of  the  sky  at  night, 
the  sounds  we  hear  and  those  which  we  attribute  to 
the  stellar  choir,  are  they,  when  understood  and 
related,  faces  looking  love  upon  us  and  voices  call¬ 
ing?  Here  the  aesthetic  impulse  invokes  other  spir¬ 
itual  powers  to  fulfill  its  premonitions.  The  natural 
processes  in  which  life  lurks  so  subtly  and  perplex- 
ingly,  are  they  beatings,  however  faint,  of  hearts 
implicitly  human,  in  geneses  of  love  and  joy  and 
spiritual  passion?  Is  the  spiritual  task  of  over¬ 
coming  the  world  the  fulfillment  of  the  vast  intrin¬ 
sic  humanness  ?  After  the  decadence  of  the  renais¬ 
sance  and  the  dullness  of  the  enlightenment,  a  great 
recovery  and  advance  of  humanism  endeavored  to 
achieve  such  answers  to  these  questionings  as  would 


42 


THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


spiritualize  the  universe,  by  the  intensified  powers 
of  the  human  soul.* 

Philosophy  and  music  were  the  chief  forms,  the 
inexhaustible  fields  of  Germany’s  interrupted,  long 
deferred  renaissance.  Music  of  the  great  German 
type  thrusts  its  intense  emotions  into  all  depths 
and  heights,  with  stupendous  intellectual  develop¬ 
ments  of  expressive  form ;  and  idealistic  philosophy 
was  its  companion,  undertaking  to  make  these 
realms  of  the  insatiable  heart  a  spiritually  ordered 
universe.  Beethoven  and  Fichte  are  inseparable. 
Similar  is  the  relation  of  this  philosophy  to  the  best 
literary  romanticism.  German  idealism  accom¬ 
plished  great  things,  in  redeeming  the  spirit  from 
the  cramping  poverty  of  the  enlightenment,  and  in 
awakening  historic  forces.  It  belongs  to  the  human¬ 
istic  thought  of  our  time  to  renew  the  work  of  these 
great  humanists,  by  methods  inclusive  of  all  human 
powers,  with  enlarged  resources  of  knowledge,  and 
in  a  more  concrete  and  vital  social  consciousness. 

As  if  fearing  defeat  from  this  and  other  forces 
of  humanism,  the  physical  antagonist  changed  its 
front,  its  armaments,  its  strategy.  Serious  have 
been  humanism’s  recent  reverses.  Formidable  ap¬ 
pears  this  new  assault  upon  the  soul. 

*A  humanistic  interpretation  of  German  idealism  is  here  affirmed. 
Every  humanist  indeed  stands  against  the  ossifications  of  the  Ger¬ 
man  renaissance  of  thought.  No  humanist  can  come  to  terms  with 
its  unexperimental  dialectic,  subservient  to  Platonic  and  scholastic 
tradition,  and  issuing  in  an  unhuman,  all-engulfing,  self-annihilat¬ 
ing  absolute,  nor  with  its  neglects  of  life  in  the  interest  of  intel- 
lectualism.  Notwithstanding,  the  idealistic  philosophy  of  the  great 
German  thinkers  was  essentially  the  humanistic  attempt  tO'  reassert 
man  against  the  world,  to  subjugate  the  physical  order  to  spiritual 
forces  whose  home  is  the  human  soul. 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


43 


§6 

Through  recent  years  the  physical  order  has  be¬ 
come  a  familiar  associate,  with  opportunities  of 
treacherous  seduction.  The  epoch  of  human  rights 
through  democracy  receded  before  the  onrush  of 
the  age  of  science.  By  that  title  we  have  dehuman¬ 
ized  the  last  decades.  It  is  a  science  pre-eminently 
physical.  The  physical  order,  which  had  repressed 
man,  gave  more  and  more  of  itself  into  his  hands. 
Baring  hypotheses  have  been  so  brilliantly  verified 
that  they  seem  to  have  sprung  not  from  the  human 
mind  but  from  nature  itself.  Through  inventions 
that  propagated  inventions  an  historic  phase 
shaped  itself,  which  seemed  undeveloped  from  the 
spiritual  advances  of  humanity,  and  with  forces 
which  had  remained  hidden  from  all  past  ages.  But 
these  servants  may  become  our  masters.  We  may 
be  enslaved  by  that  which  promised  us  a  larger 
liberty. 

The  age  of  science  cannot  indeed  be  radically  crit¬ 
icised  because  its  contribution  to  human  welfare 
falls  short  of  expectation,  and  because  the  old  bur¬ 
dens  still  crush  men,  not  only  in  exigencies  like  the 
world  war,  but  continuously.  Comparisons  of  this 
epoch  in  general  with  other  times  give  us  much 
cause  for  self-congratulation.  We  may  reflect  upon 
our  heightened  standards  for  judging  human  wel¬ 
fare.  Men  estimate  their  conditions  not  so  much  by 
what  they  enjoy  or  suffer  as  by  what  they  desire; 
and  inventions  stimulate  desire. 

Beneficent  powers  of  the  age  of  science  are  still 
unfolding,  probably  have  only  begun  their  growth. 


44  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Frightful  discoveries  of  infernal  destructiveness 
into  which  these  energies  can  be  turned  are  miti¬ 
gated  by  the  constructive  applications  of  the  de¬ 
structive  agencies.  Disturbances  of  social  condi¬ 
tions  are  to  be  expected  from  any  great  newly  ap¬ 
plied  forces,  physical  or  spiritual.  Especially  omi¬ 
nous  are  the  transfers  of  men  from  natural  to 
artificial  environments,  the  exchange  of  healthful 
simplicities  for  feverish  complexities,  the  descent 
from  work  with  a  personal  interest  to  a  depersonal¬ 
ized  drudgery,  often  less  exhaustive  but  generally 
less  educative.  These  evils  are  relieved  in  part  by 
the  tendency  of  applied  science  to  amend  the  sordid 
monotonies  of  simple  conditions.  The  congestions 
may  prove  to  be  transitional.  The  mechanization  of 
workers  by  their  work,  desperate  as  the  rapid  in¬ 
tensifications  now  appear,  is  checked  here  and  there 
by  developments  in  the  mechanizing  processes 
themselves.  The  growth  of  mutual  antagonisms  in 
the  industrial  order  seems  at  present  irremediable 
by  anything  that  this  age  has  to  offer,  but  increas¬ 
ing  cooperations  may  be  thrust  upon  us.  In  any 
case,  wind  and  tide  are  too  strong  for  us.  We  can 
only  drive  on,  wishing  for  calmer  seas. 

All  this  is  tentative.  We  fear  dire  disappoint¬ 
ments.  Other  ages  have  been  weighted  too  heavily 
by  their  own  attainments  to  withstand  the  assaults 
of  wind  and  wave.  It  is  significant  that  such  hopes 
as  have  been  mentioned  of  the  better  issue  depend 
upon  the  development  of  forces  more  mechanical 
than  human,  in  that  they  do  not  belong  to  human¬ 
ity’s  spiritual  powers.  The  age  of  physical  science 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


45 


regards  them  as  sweeping  men  along  with  them.  If 
they  should  prove  beneficent,  the  soul  of  man  would 
have  to  thank  them,  not  its  own  forces.  To  trust 
a  mechanic  tendency  too  mighty  for  human  control 
is  still  to  be  at  the  mercy  of  the  immense  antagonist, 
both  in  its  benefits  and  its  mischiefs  the  antagonist 
of  that  which  humanity  must  demand  of  itself. 

§7 

Even  if  the  age  of  science  should  refute  all  these 
charges  except  the  last  mentioned,  the  principal 
challenge  to  it  might  still  remain  unanswered : 
what  is  the  age  of  science  doing  for  the  human 
soul? 

“For  we  throw  out  acclamations  of  self -thanking,  self-ad¬ 
miring, 

With,  at  every  mile  run  faster — (O  the  wondrous,  won¬ 
drous  age ! ) 

Little  thinking  if  we  work  our  souls  as  nobly  as  our  iron, 

Or  if  angels  will  commend  us  at  the  goal  of  pilgrimage. 
If  we  trod  the  deeps  of  ocean,  if  we  struck  the  stars  in  rising, 
If  we  wrapped  the  globe  intensely  with  one  hot  electric 
breath, 

’Twere  but  power  within  our  tether,  no  new  spirit  power 
comprising, 

And  in  life  we  were  not  greater  men,  nor  bolder  men  in 
death.” 

The  problem  is  not  to  be  formulated  for  the  indi¬ 
vidual,  but  demands  wide  and  deep  social  interpre¬ 
tations.  The  conditions  of  life  wrought  by  physical 
science  might  be  favorable  to  individual  happiness 
generally,  and  to  efficiently  organized  cooperations, 


46  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

and  yet  be  repressive  of  the  soul  of  humanity,  in 
which  each  man  must  find  his  own  soul. 

On  the  credit  side,  our  age  has  accomplished 
great  things,  in  physical  lines,  to  help  the  soul  to 
help  itself.  The  service  to  health  is  only  one  large 
item  in  the  long  list  of  such  benefits.  Where  life  is 
stunted  and  confined,  first  aid  is  sought  from  phys¬ 
ical  science,  just  as  the  first  thing  to  do  for  a  hun¬ 
gry  man  is  to  feed  him.  and  for  a  cold  man  is  to 
warm  him.  Our  science  knows  how  to  feed  and 
what  fires  to  kindle.  Urgent  are  men’s  physical 
needs,  and  unless  these  are  met,  talk  of  ministering 
to  the  soul  is  mostly  vaporing.  Nor  is  the  benefit 
limited  to  suffering,  and  to  urgent  necessity. 
Requisite  for  any  improvement  or  advance  are 
physical  appliances,  and  of  these  our  science  has 
increasing  store.  But  first  aids  are  only  first  aids. 
Though  they  continue  through  the  whole  process, 
they  are  essentially  preliminary.  The  body  warmed 
and  fed  may  house  a  cold  and  hungry  soul.  When 
our  science  extols  its  own  work  as  anything  more 
than  subordinate  and  preliminary,  it  ignores  the 
souks  worth.  From  the  last  imagined  ascent  of  the 
path  to  its  heaven  of  well-being,  even  though  it 
should  have  ferried  us  across  the  river  of  death, 
there  opens  before  us,  as  in  the  Bedford  tinker’s 
dream,  the  portal  of  the  physical  abyss. 

What,  beyond  the  services  which  have  been  indi¬ 
cated  so  inadequately,  has  our  physical  science  done 
for  the  soul  ?  It  has  transformed  the  face  of  man’s 
earth  and  of  human  life  upon  it.  A  great  thinker 
has  said,  employing  perhaps  not  his  deepest  reflec- 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


47 


tion,  that  important  inventions  are  the  epoch- 
making-  events  of  history,  which  wiser  generations 
than  ours  will  commemorate  as  we  now  celebrate 
military  achievements  and  political  decisions. 
From  the  first  cart-wheel,  through  locomotive  en¬ 
gines  and  electric  girdles  of  thought  which  by  land 
and  sea  and  air  bind  imperial  republics  together 
and  draw  isolated  and  backward  peoples  into  the 
one  world-civilization,  through  machine-making 
machinery  which  scraps  worn-out  types  of  social 
order  and  shapes  another  with  immense,  new,  ap¬ 
palling  issues,  it  is  physical  science  in  its  inventive 
operations  that  is  decisive  of  the  more  obvious,  at 
least,  of  human  relations,  in  their  formation  of  the 
one  humanity. 

Yet,  when  we  boast  of  the  world's  advance  under 
science’s  shepherding,  we  may  do  well  to  compare 
ourselves  with  less  scientific  periods,  estimating  all 
epochs  by  those  things  which  make  for  inner 
wealth.  By  these  must  all  externals  be  appraised. 
Without  these  we  attain  only  increasingly  compli¬ 
cated  degeneracies.  The  Athens  of  Phidias  and 
Sophocles  did  very  well  without  our  scientific  in¬ 
struments.  Other  influences  enriched  the  soil 
which  grew  Petrarch  and  Shakespeare,  and  the 
painters  who  have  remained  incomparable,  and  the 
many  more  in  ages  of  undeveloped  science  and  in¬ 
vention  to  whom  we  now  look  back  with  amaze¬ 
ment.  We  think  with  still  greater  reverence  of  the 
Buddha,  Zoroaster,  the  prophets  of  Israel,  and  of 
the  name  which  is  above  every  name. r  Though  rev¬ 
olutionized  conditions  which  renew  the  face  of  the 


4S  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

earth  also  enter  deeply  into  the  unfolding  life  of 
humanity,  they  meet  there  forces  of  a  higher  order, 
and  the  spirit,  the  supreme.  They  are  but  servants 
of  these  lords,  instruments  for  the  supreme  human 
disposer  of  all  things.  Unless  this  deeper  potency 
be  developed,  through  uses  indeed  of  these  tools, 
but  by  the  impulsion  of  its  own  underived  life,  all 
our  enginery  is  as  gold  in  the  slippery  hands  of  a 
fool.  It  is  the  heart  that  must  be  kept  with  all  dili¬ 
gence,  for  out  of  it,  not  out  of  any  of  its  instru¬ 
ments,  are  the  issues  of  life.  Great  may  be  the 
stimulus  of  these  physical  successes  upon  each  soul, 
and  upon  humanity’s  interblended  life.  But  their 
floods  may  wreck  the  spirit  which  they  should  bear 
on,  by  the  spirit’s  own  piloting,  to  discoveries  of 
new  spiritual  realms.  In  every  external  progress 
the  internal  leader  must  assert  his  generalship,  lest 
his  insubordinate  forces  follow  ways  that  are  not 
in  the  direction  of  his  advance,  become  an  army  of 
tfye  last  Darius,  destructive  to  its  king  by  its  very 
size  and  complexity. 

The  scientific  temper  approaches  the  aesthetic  in 
the  attempt  to  reconcile  man  with  man’s  world. 
Though  nature  has  disclosed  to  science  a  repellent 
mystery  of  strife  and  suffering,  and  we  have  knowl¬ 
edge  of  that  which  Paul  felt  when  he  wrote  of  the 
whole  creation  groaning  and  travailing  in  pain  to¬ 
gether,  yet  there  has  been  opened  to  us  an  indefi¬ 
nitely  enlarging  borderland,  ruled  by  kindly  pow¬ 
ers.  We  once  supposed  them  hostile,  because  we 
unwittingly  crossed  their  irresistible  courses.  This" 
intimacy  with  them  is  fellowship  in  work,  of  all 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


49 


\ 

alliances  the  most  intimate.  The  friendliness  be¬ 
tween  the  man  of  science  and  a  widening  part  and 
aspect  of  nature,  is  an  added  value  among  the  riches 
of  the  soul.  It  is  felt  by  all  who  share  his  knowl¬ 
edge,  though  in  a  small  measure,  and  are  apprecia¬ 
tive  of  his  beneficent  applications  of  it.  Here  is 
one  of  the  sharpest  distinctions  between  culture, 
which  meets  the  world  fearlessly,  and  savagery 
cowering  before  the  natural,  which  appears  so  alien 
to  men  in  the  stage  which  we  confusedly  call  natural. 
This  scientific  friendliness  helps  to  guide  painter, 
musician,  poet,  and  the  artistic  sense  of  an  age, 
into  intimacies  of  nature  and  man. 

Yet,  in  this  alliance,  shall  the  hegemony  be  as¬ 
serted  by  soul  or  by  things?  It  is  a  servitude  to 
things  when  men  find  their  good  in  them,  bow  down 
to  them  as  to  favorable  and  generous  gods.  Only 
when  we  initiate  a  spiritual  companionship  with 
them  do  we  gain  the  abiding  reconciliation,  the 
friendship  which  reverences  them  too  deeply  to  use 
them  against  the  supremely  human  purpose,  which 
we  then  share  with  them.  Science  makes  ready 
the  large  upper  room  for  the  august  feast  of 
humanity.  A  purely  human  self-assertion  must 
rule  the  physical  relations  into  which  science  brings 
us. 

Science,  in  its  service  to  soul,  has  removed  from 
man’s  path  unintellectual  and  unspiritual  hin¬ 
drances.  Frorp  every  department  of  human  activity 
it  has  brushed  away  metaphysical  confusions,  ir¬ 
relevant  prejudgments.  Though  it  has  often  offered 
in  their  place  decisions  that  must  be  revised,  yet 


5®  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

scientific  method  progressively  corrects  its  own  mis¬ 
takes,  and  wins  continually  firmer  grasps  of  the 
actual.  It  has  routed  superstition.  It  has  dashed 
down  the  sword  of  the  monstrous  cherubim  which 
guard  man’s  heritage  against  man.  It  has  partaken 
of  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil,  which 
is  a  seedling  of  the  tree  of  life.  It  has  stultified 
dogma  and  ecclesiasticism,  claims  to  infallibility  of 
institution  or  individual,  every  external  authority, 
which  as  authority  imposes  slavery  of  soul,  en- 
feeblement  of  mind  and  debauchery  of  conscience. 
These  conquests  have  not  only  annnexed  wide 
stretches  of  the  physical  order,  they  have  also  de¬ 
livered,  quickened,  illumined  the  soul  itself.  The 
age  of  science  has  enfranchised  latent  human  po¬ 
tencies,  and  has  given  them  scope.  It  has  done 
great  service  to  our  inmost  selves  by  confronting  us 
with  concrete,  practicable  difficulties,  to  be  over¬ 
come  in  an  unshadowy,  unghostly  conflict,  and  to 
issues  which  need  not  be  fought  over.  It  has  taught 
men  to  see  the  truth,  and  to  be  veracious  witnesses 
of  it.  It  abhors  a  lie.  It  has  so  brought  men  into 
the  actual  that  the  thought  and  life  of  recent  dec¬ 
ades  seem,  in  comparison  with  some  other  times, 
like  vigorous  work  hours  after  a  morning  dream. 

The  science  of  our  time  has  done  other  high 
things.  It  has,  though  to  a  less  extent  than  was 
expected,  given  support,  opportunity,  and  material 
to  those  whose  work  is  a  more  direct  ministry  to 
soul.  It  has  bestowed  upon  compassion  instru¬ 
ments,  and  therefore  stimulus.  It  has  brought  to¬ 
gether  wealth  and  need,  in  world-wide  contacts 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


51 


which  have  worked  to  convert  insensibility  into 
fellow-feeling  and  generosity.  Physical  science,  in 
its  industrial  enterprises,  has  forced  men  into  com¬ 
binations,  which  may  be  increasingly  socialized  if 
men  will.  Humanism  itself  demands  a  growing 
energy  in  the  exploitation  of  nature,  both  for  tools 
to  work  with,  and  for  larger  arousements  of  its  own 
powers.  All  the  higher  contributions  of  physical 
science  to  the  human  soul  are  demands  that  the  age 
of  science  pour  itself  into  an  epoch  of  the  human 
spirit. 

The  age  of  science  has  not  been  bereft  of  proph¬ 
ets  of  the  soul.  In  their  realms  of  creative  imagina¬ 
tion,  fundamental  thinking,  spiritual  intuition,  so¬ 
cial  passion,  they  have  made  large  use  of  the  scien¬ 
tific  mind  and  its  veracious  conscience.  Their  in¬ 
fluence  has  reacted  upon  great  leaders  in  science, 
who  are  not  among  those  who  would  keep  men 
within  the  bounds  of  the  physical.  Not  in  that  in¬ 
ferior  company  belong  the  names  whose  fame  is 
secure,  because  they,  modestly  serviceable  in  their 
departments,  have  left  the  souls  of  men  free  to  ad¬ 
venture  higher  realms.  Or,  if  some  genuine  leaders 
have  undertaken  to  bind  souls  to  things,  it  is  not 
that  part  of  their  work  which  abides.  A  few  of  the 
higher  scientific  rank  have  risen  into  the  spiritual 
order,  bringing  their  acquisitions  to  the  nobler  serv¬ 
ice.  But  even  in  them  the  sources  of  leadership  are 
largely  from  influences  which  preceded  the  age  of 
science,  or  developed  along  other  lines.  Our  guides 
have  drawn  from  the  awakenings  associated  with 
the  French  revolution,  and  from  the  idealisms  of 


52  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

the  German  renaissance.  The  epoch  of  the  modern 
rebirth  of  humanity  is,  in  them,  renewed  and  de¬ 
veloped.  Such  sources  of  vitality  they  have  inter¬ 
preted  as  onflowings  of  that  great  tide  of  human¬ 
ism,  increasingly  social,  which  has  been  the  domi¬ 
nant  current,  often  flowing  beneath  the  surface,  of 
sacred,  classic  and  modern  history.  Into  this  flood, 
as  they  have  appreciated,  the  choked  and  parceled 
stream  of  medievalism  forced  its  way.  From  re¬ 
mote  treasures  of  peoples  and  races  they  have 
brought  energies  for  the  development  of  the  human 
soul.  And  their  influence  has  drawn  into  itself,  that 
it  might  be  kept  pure  and  sweet,  the  simple,  com¬ 
mon  hopes  and  loves,  toils  and  pains,  joys  and  as¬ 
pirations,  which  are  forever  the  essentials  of 
human  life. 

§8 

Much  more  than  the  service  which  has  been  so 
sketchily  indicated  has  the  age  of  physical  science 
done  for  soul.  Yet  each  contribution  must  be 
watched  lest  it  should  be  repressive,  and  there  must 
always  be  the  fight  to  keep  the  spirit  dominant. 
Thus  far  we  have  set  down  the  credit  entries — with 
deductions — of  the  account  of  the  age  of  physical 
science  with  the  soul.  There  is  something  on  the 
debit  side.  Some  of  the  debits  may  pass  for  credits 
until  they  are  scrutinized. 

The  age  of  physical  science  has,  in  its  character¬ 
istic  task,  accomplished  nothing  radical  and  per¬ 
manent  against  that  repression  of  the  soul  by  the 
physical  order  which  dimmed  the  renaissance.  We 
cannot  claim  the  conquest  of  the  physical  when  the 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


53 


circle  illumined  by  our  arc  light  reveals  a  greater 
circumference  of  darkness.  Our  larger  informa¬ 
tion  of  the  past  history  of  the  universe  has  made  us 
the  more  conscious  that  the  entire  duration  of 
man's  tenancy  upon  the  transient  earth  is  as  the 
kindling  and  extinguishing  of  a  shooting  star. 
“Look!"  you  cry,  and  before  the  eyes  of  your  com¬ 
panion  can  locate  it,  it  is  gone.  We  have  reverted 
to  the  epoch  of  the  enlightenment.  We  find  that 
the  temper  of  what  we  thought  our  unprecedented 
time  is  that  decadent  absorption  in  activities  limited 
and  repressed. 

The  arrogation  of  the  chief  place  for  physical 
science  makes  manhood  inferior  to  size,  duration, 
force,  which  cannot  rise  above  their  essential  quali¬ 
ties,  however  big  and  long  and  strong  they  be.  The 
depreciation  of  ourselves  loses  that  for  which  we 
made  the  surrender.  It  loses  the  meaning  of 
things,  which  must  be  declared  by  mental  activities 
beyond  this  scientific  investigation.  It  loses  the 
moral  power  which  might  be  developed  in  the  sub¬ 
jugation  of  the  physical  to  the  spiritual.  The  age 
of  physical  science  sacrifices  more  in  nature  itself 
than  it  gains,  unless  it  shall  learn  to  use  its  exact 
and  accumulating  explorations  of  nature  for  higher 
gains.  Its  gain  is  loss  if  we  are  forced  to  confess, 
“Little  we  see  in  nature  that  is  ours,"  for  “We 
have  given  our  hearts  away." 

The  imposing  claim  that  our  age  has  initiated 
man  into  the  citizenship  of  the  universe  needs  to  be 
discriminatively  estimated.  It  is  indeed  an  impres¬ 
sive  thought  that  our  evolutionary  science  finds  our 


54  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

human  life  to  be  an  unfolding  of  the  illimitable  past 
of  innumerable  worlds ;  that  we  are  taught  to  recog¬ 
nize  our  own  life  in  all  life,  and  its  basis  in  all  that 
contributes  to  life  in  any  wise ;  and  that  this  inheri¬ 
tance  constitutes  enduring,  multiplying,  developing 
relations.  We  seem  to  be  delivered  from  the  plane¬ 
tary  provincialism  of  the  human  into  a  really  cos¬ 
mic  cosmopolitanism;  and  this  consciousness  in¬ 
volves  practical,  concrete  knowledge,  which  helps 
in  many  ways  to  efficiency  and  worth.  We  belong 
to  all,  though  we  cannot  say  that  all  belongs  to  us. 

The  meaning  of  citizenship  in  the  universe  will 
meet  us  toward  the  end  of  our  journey.  The  mean- 

•v 

ing  must  include  all  that  physical  science  can  im¬ 
part  to  it.  At  this  point,  certain  preliminary  re¬ 
flections  are  suggested.  One  is,  that  the  conception, 
in  order  to  be  worthy  of  the  human  soul,  must  be 
ideal  and  spiritual,  rising  above  the  physical  science 
which  has  helped  to  form  it,  initiating  us  into  dis¬ 
coveries  and  interpretations  of  a  higher  order.  An¬ 
other  reflection  is,  that  our  claim  to  this  citizenship 
must  not  disregard  either  that  aspect  of  the  phys¬ 
ical  which  opposes  us,  or  the  process  of  spiritual 
development  in  which  we  find  our  real  selves,  with 
the  responsibility  to  compromise  nothing  of  our  re¬ 
sistance  to  the  great  antagonist.  From  these  dis¬ 
criminations  unfold  the  questions:  Of  what  status 
is  our  citizenship  in  the  universe?  Is  it  a  free  citi¬ 
zenship?  Does  it  subject  us  to  powers  of  a  lower 
order  than  ourselves,  or  does  it  summon  us  to  the 
task  of  reconstructing  them? 

Every  acquisition  shifts  to  the  debit  side,  when 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


55 


for  our  possessions  we  exchange  the  possessor. 
“These  things  which  thou  hast  provided,  whose 
shall  they  be?”  It  was  indeed  necessary  to  gain 
the  possessions.  Each  age  must  do  the  task  set  for 
it.  Scientific  discovery  and  invention  are  promi¬ 
nent  in  the  special  task  committed  to  the  evident 
needs,  abilities,  and  opportunities  of  recent  dec¬ 
ades.  This  part  of  our  toil  must  be  continued, 
though  not  necessarily  as  the  largest  part.  But  for 
whom  is  it  being  done?  For  man?  But  the  human 
energies  cultivated  by  an  age  of  physical  science 
are  directed  to  the  world  as  viewed  by  physical 
science,  and  to  men  as  immersed  in  that  physical 
world.  Even  the  enfranchisement  from  dogmatic 
superstition,  and  the  awakenings  of  beneficent 
helpfulness,  have  turned  their  liberated  powers  in 
that  direction,  in  which  their  freedom  is  again  re¬ 
stricted.  The  deeper  human  energies,  which  are 
concerned  with  higher  objects,  have  been  subordi¬ 
nated  or  ignored. 

Prominent  in  this  epoch  has7been  the  attempt  to 
account  for  the  human  by  the  physical,  to  reduce 
mental  powers  to  weight  and  measure,  counting  it 
a  success  to  express  any  of  them  by  a  mathematical 
formula.  Physical  science  is  indeed  unable  to  give 
a  spiritual  answer  to  the  question,  “What  are  we?” 
For  it  can  give  no  answer.  It  can  only  make  its 
own  contribution — along  with  other  experiences — 
to  the  answer.  It  renders  invaluable  service  here 
in  its  forming  of  genetic  knowledge  of  ourselves, 
as  it  traces  our  alliances  with  the  mechanism  which 
we  must  learn,  in  order  to  use;  in  determining  the 


56  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

survivals  in  human  beings  of  that  which  was  before 
them,  in  order  to  equip  our  spiritual  task  with  the 
knowledge  of  what  we  have  to  work  with  and 
against;  in  distinguishing  and  mutually  relating  the 
inner  and  the  outer  energies.  These  are  valuable 
contributions  to  the  answer.  But  if  they  are  con¬ 
fined  within  physical  limitations,  they  obscure  the 
answer. 

The  attempt  to  account  for  the  human  by  the 

physical  encounters  this  difficulty,  that  the  familiar 

assumptions  of  physical  science  are  losing  their 

fixed  meanings.  It  is  found  that  scientific  formulae 

must  be  continually  revised,  to  be  sufficient  even  for 

their  own  field.  Before  our  eyes  matter  has  changed 

to  energy.  We  look  out  today  not  upon  a  static  or 

a '  cyclic  universe,  but  upon  a  plastic  universe. 

There  is  an  opening  question,  whether  the  work  of 

physical  science  cannot  be  done  best  in  alliance 

with  a  spiritual  interpretation  of  reality.  Idealistic 

thought,  by  which  is  not  meant  abstractly  concep- 

♦ 

tualistic  thought,  may  give  to  physical  science  the 
clearest  task,  freest  scope,  and  most  serviceable 
methods. 

Still  the  habit  clings,  to  reduce  the  human  to  the 
physical,  and  it  will  continue  till  the  age  character¬ 
ized  by  the  dominance  of  physical  science  yields  to 
an  age  of  another  quality.  Yet  we  can  say  for  it, 
though  not  to  its  praise,  that  the  age  which  directed 
itself  to  the  physical  has  become  the  vindicator  of 
the  spirit,  in  two  respects  at  least.  It  has  shown 
that  the  invasion  of  materialism  can  never  again  be 
mobilized  with  so  great  an  initial  advantage,  and 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST  57 

with  such  unpreparedness  on  the  part  of  the  human. 
It  has  also  shown  that  the  pursuit  of  truth,  along 
any  path,  encounters  spiritual  considerations  by 
which  it  must  be  judged,  and  in  which  it  finds  its 
own  fulfillments. 

The  failure  of  physical  science,  when  usurping 
beyond  its  own  domain,  is  evident  in  that  form  of 
social  science  which  attempts  to  interpret  social  re¬ 
lations  by  physical  conditions.  Its  practical  failure 
before  the  accumulating  social  chaos  is  among  the 
most  ludicrous  of  current  tragedies.  Only  in  spir¬ 
itual  humanism  can  the  social  sciences  find  supplies 
for  the  poignant  social  needs  of  our  times.  The 
sociology  which  has  passed  through  the  biological 
phase  into  the  psychological  is  passing  on  into  the 
spiritual,  where  practical  use  is  made  of  the  accum¬ 
ulations  of  all  the  dreary  way. 

It  may  have  been  inevitable  that  the  decades 
which  found  their  urgent  task  to  be  the  scientific 
knowledge  and  exploitation  of  the  physical  order 
should  become  obsessed  by  a  necessary  function, 
until  by  a  reawakening  of  humanism  this  transi¬ 
tional  time  might  find  its  place  in  the  true  service 
to  humanity,  spiritually  discerned.  But  there  is  a 
more  ignoble  moral  quality,  a  voluntary  decadence, 
in  the  high-priesthood  of  science  before  the  idols  of 
the  market-place. 

Science  may  indeed  render,  as  reasonable  serv¬ 
ice,  the  manifolding  of  the  world's  wealth.  Any 
limitations  of  the  inventive  expansions  of  industry 
and  commerce,  directed  to  the  general  welfare,  must 
be  crossed  over.  In  these  ministries  and  disciplines 


58  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


the  human  soul  may  form  itself.  It  is  a  question 
of  the  directive  purpose.  Only  Phoebus  Apollo  can 
drive  the  chariot  of  the  sun.  If  any  other  than  the 
deity  of  the  higher  human  potencies  attempts  to  di¬ 
rect  the  aerial  steeds,  harnessed  for  the  service  of 
man,  the  result  is  the  destruction  of  man’s  domain. 
Even  if  scientifically  developed  industry  and  its  ad¬ 
ministration  were  competent  to  organize  themselves 
for  the  general  benefit,  and  if  the  equitable  distri¬ 
bution  of  increasing  wealth  might  be  secured  by 
anything  less  than  humanistic  forces,  such  consum¬ 
mations,  if  not  achieved  for  the  finer,  purer,  larger 
life  of  men,  might  well  prove  to  be  a  more  inclusive 
bondage  of  men  to  things. 

The  age  of  science,  vulgarized  into  the  age  of 
steam,  of  electricity — or  is  it  the  unfragrant  age 
of  gasoline? — by  what  other  nickname  will  it  dub 
itself  in  honor  of  the  material!  Or  if  it  becomes 
the  age  of  tidal  and  solar  energies,  actinic  rays, 
atomic  disruptions,  what  is  the  real  gain!  The 
practical  materialism  of  which  science  is  unworth¬ 
ily  the  minister  is  a  nightmare  from  which  our  ob¬ 
sessed  souls  shake  and  groan  themselves  awake: 
universities  offering  as  a  sacrifice  to  efficiency,  not 
antiquated  classicism,  which  is  of  no  importance, 
but  the  genius  of  perennial  Hellenism ;  popular  edu¬ 
cation  “fitting  for  life”  and  losing  life  in  the  pro¬ 
cess;  wealth  emerging  in  a  couple  of  generations 
from  its  parvenient  vulgarities,  to  establish  the  con¬ 
summate  vulgarity,  the  pride  of  wealth,  while  the 
mass  of  men,  unsuccessful  in  their  frantic  covetous¬ 
ness,  prepare  the  fight  for  social  chaos;  meanwhile, 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


59 


vital  simplicities  bartered  for  mechanical  artificiali¬ 
ties;  productions  multiplied  and  no  purpose  to  use 
them  for ;  possessions  manifolded  and  no  possessor : 
— but  the  tale  is  too  long  to  tell.  One  word  may  be 
barbarous  enough  to  express  it  all — Hohenzollern- 
ization. 

Of  no  slight  significance  is  our  time’s  conscious¬ 
ness  of  being  new.  Exasperating  is  the  smug 
banality,  that  if  a  citizen  of  any  previous  age  should 
come  back  to  earth,  he  would  be  aghast  at  new 
sights,  noises,  and  smells  at  every  turn.  We  have 
indeed  accustomed  ourselves  to  say  that  every  his¬ 
toric  phase  develops  from  its  predecessor.  Evolu¬ 
tion  has  been  our  watchword — how  ungeneticalty 
conceived  we  may  see  presently.  But  that  affirma¬ 
tion,  though  itself  claiming  novelty,  does  not  ex¬ 
press  our  self-assurance  that  the  age  of  physical 
science  stands  distinct  and  separate  from  its  past, 
on  a  newly  furnished  earth,  under  a  newly  deco¬ 
rated  sky. 

This  characteristic  of  the  age  of  science  seems  at 
first  thought  incongruous  with  its  most  imposing 
novelty.  Our  modern  knowledge,  we  affirm,  is 
gained  by  the  study  of  becomings.  Our  science  is  a 
tracing  of  continuities.  Our  biological  advances  of 
knowledge  claim  to  be  consummately  genetic,  evo¬ 
lutionary.  Yet  that  doctrine  of  evolution  which 
has  been  dominant  till  recently,  and  which  is  still 
nearly  unshaken  in  the  popular  apprehension,  has 
endeavored  to  express  vital  changes  by  shiftings  of 
unchanging  elements,  to  account  for  growth  by  re¬ 
combinations  of  lifeless  constituents.  But  no  dif- 


60  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

ferentiations,  integrations,  complications  of  these 
things  can  ever  attain  a  vital  connection  between 
any  imagined  instants  of  static  grouping,  nor  lead 
along  the  path  of  life,  nor  even  find  that  path.  The 
detailed  refutation  of  the  imposing  fallacy  I  must 
leave  to  those  in  whose  department  the  exposure 
belongs.  If  Bergson  and  his  associates  are  right — 
and  I  assume  the  cogency  of  their  luminous  state¬ 
ments — the  age  of  science,  notwithstanding  its 
vast  contributions  to  a  genuine  study  of  evolution, 
is  weakest  where  it  conceited  itself  strongest,  in 
evolutionary  principle  and  genetic  method. 

Our  historic  science  has  shared  with  physical 
science  a  thoroughness  and  accuracy  which  have 
turned  into  folly  multitudes  of  old  wives'  tales,  re¬ 
iterated  for  centuries.  It  has  reversed  many  his¬ 
toric  judgments  long  unchallenged.  Unwearied  are 
its  investigations.  Very  great,  but  manageable,  is 
its  wealth  of  verified  and  classified  knowledge.  It 
has  evoked  ancient  civilizations  and  primitivisms 
inconceivably  remote,  from  long  concealed  tombs 
and  cairns.  This  historic  science  has  sought  to  de¬ 
rive  event  from  event,  historic  phase  from  historic 
phase,  as  working  by  genetic  method,  evolutionary 
principle.  But  the  forces  which  it  has  least  ac¬ 
knowledged,  in  what  was  recently  at  least  its  domi¬ 
nant  school,  are  just  the  personal  forces  of 
concentrated  vitality  which  it  has  attempted  to  de¬ 
personalize,  thus  losing  the  social  energies  which 
are  meaningless  without  the  recognition  of  the 
personal.  Not  by  such  procedure  can  life  be  traced 
along  the  course  of  human  history,  which  is  human- 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


61 


ity’s  life.  Again  it  is  evident  that  this  age  is 
weakest  where  it  conceited  itself  strongest,  in  evo¬ 
lutionary  principle  and  genetic  method. 

The  sin  propagated  by  the  Hohenzollern  was  sin 
against  humanity  in  the  deepest  sense:  it  was  sin 
against  the  continuity  of  humanity’s  growing  life. 
The  time’s  self-glorification  of  being  new  became 
as  rampant  in  Germany  as  the  false  prophets  after 
whom  she  raved.  She  would  force  a  new  spirit,  a 
new  order,  underived  from  the  past,  disconnected 
from  the  great  human  process,  as  her  leaders  cut 
themselves  off  from  mankind.  The  international 
law,  which  is  the  developing  conscience  of  the  great 
human  brotherhood,  the  inner  values  which  men 
have  been  learning  to  recognize,  the  amenities  of 
mutual  tolerance  and  respect  which  men  have  been 
gradually  seeking  to  live  by,  the  impartings  and 
receivings  between  nations  to  whom  have  been  sev¬ 
erally  entrusted  the  diverse  but  harmonious  out- 
workings  of  humanity’s  progress — Germany  would 
have  none  of  these.  Repudiating  present  coopera¬ 
tions  and  sympathies,  she  would  sever  herself  from 
the  past  and  from  the  future.  Yet,  unable  to  break 
away  from  the  course  of  history,  she  descended  the 
ascent,  back  to  Assyrian  inhumanities,  to  bestial- 
ized  lust  of  ruin,  rape,  torture,  indiscriminate  mur¬ 
der.  Attempting  disconnection  with  the  past  of 
humanity,  Germany  annulled  for  herself  her  own 
past,  whose  glory  has  been  beneficent  to  the  whole 
world,  and  shall  be,  to  the  confusion  of  her  betray¬ 
ers,  for  all  the  future. 

Our  heart  mourns  like  a  harp  for  Germany — for 


62  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

we  are  disciples  and  foster-children  of  the  true  Ger¬ 
many,  the  musician’s,  scholar’s,  thinker’s  home¬ 
land.  We  long  to  follow  her  guiding  feet  again, 
when,  purged  of  filth  and  blood,  they  once  more 
tread  the  heights.  We  would  not  have  her  add  to 
her  offense  the  undiscriminating  plea  of  the  sins 
of  other  nations;  but  we  would  join  in  the  confes¬ 
sion  which  must  be  the  beginning  of  her  spiritual 
recovery  and  ours,  by  summoning  to  the  supreme 
judgment-seat  those  forces  of  the  time  which  cut 
themselves  off  from  the  universal  spirit  of  human¬ 
ity,  derive  from  that  which  is  beneath  the  human, 
direct  themselves  away  from  the  soul’s  enlarging 
purpose. 

In  the  conviction  of  our  necessary  union  with 
humanity’s  advance,  there  is  attempted  in  the  next 
three  chapters  an  estimate  of  the  humanizing  forces 
of  Hellas,  Galilee,  and  their  modern  heirs.  Devel¬ 
opments  of  humanism  in  other  climes  and  civiliza¬ 
tions  are  omitted,  but  not  in  any  depreciation  of 
their  enrichment  of  the  humanity  which  forms  it¬ 
self  universally.  The  brief  review  may  make  more 
distinct  the  judgment,  that  our  time  is  a  decadent 
age,  which  has  failed  to  maintain  vitalizing  union 
with  the  universal  current  of  human  life  which  we 
call  history.  In  separation  from  that,  no  man  and 
no  time  can  live  a  life  worthy  to  be  called  human. 
Such  unity  with  the  past  can  be  secured  only  by  a 
humanistic  age.  Like  one  who  forgets  his  child¬ 
hood  and  neglects  to  renew  his  youth,  like  a  nation 
that  drifts  away  from  her  origins  and  from  the 
epochs  in  which  her  liberties  were  founded,  forget- 


THE  IMMENSE  ANTAGONIST 


63 


ting  the  reverent  celebration  of  memorial  days, 
like  waters  of  a  spent  tidal  wave  wasting  into  salt 
and  slime  because  they  have  arrogantly  rushed  be¬ 
yond  their  home,  the  sea — such  is  an  age  which  in 
the  conceit  of  newness  and  underived  greatness, 
ignores  its  living  union  with  the  advancing  life  of 
mankind.  Because  its  brilliant  knowledge  of  the 
physical  outstrips  all  comparison  with  the  science 
of  other  times — its  science  of  human  relations  has 
run  a  less  triumphant  course — and  because  the  ap¬ 
plications  of  its  science  have  made  new  the  surface 
of  human  existence,  it  has  indulged  an  unhuman 
self-sufficiency  which  costs  it  the  very  sources  of 
its  life. 

Either  way  of  yielding  to  the  immense  antagon¬ 
ist,  in  either  of  its  assaults,  is  humanity's  loss  of  its 
own  soul.  When  the  physical  overwhelms  us, 
crushing  out  our  truly  human  life,  nothing  but 
brutishness  is  left.  But  the  issue  is  the  same,  and 
the  manifestations  are  essentially  the  same,  when 
the  physical,  seeming  to  subordinate  itself  to  the 
human,  lures  us  into  the  pursuit  of  physical  ends. 
Against  both  the  invasion  and  the  seduction  of  the 
great  antagonist,  the  spirit  must  assert  itself. 

But  there  are  many  whose  hearts  humanity  has 
touched.  From  their  fellowship,  cemented  by  sub¬ 
lime  resistances  and  sufferings,  issues  the  spirit  of 
the  better  time.  In  them  the  humiliated  age  of 
science,  with  physical  powers  which  need  spiritual 
aims,  passes,  that  it  may  fulfill  itself  in  ministries 
to  the  human  soul.  “Thine  handmaid  is  a  servant, 
to  wash  the  feet  of  the  servants  of  my  lord.” 


IV 


THE  HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION 


Sweet  bride  of  Hellas ,  from  the  dead 
By  hand  of  strong  Alcides  led, 

Again  to  die, 

Grasp  thou  the  pierced  hand  instead 
Eternally. 


§1 


IFE  unifies  itself  from  its  great  awakenings, 


The  supreme  love  should  ever  deepen  and 


•  intensify  youth's  romance.  Wisdom  should 
unfold  from  the  great  teacher  in  whom  it  met  us. 
The  spiritual  life  should  continually  renew  the  first 
revelation  of  itself  to  our  amazed  souls.  The 
worths  of  life  should  grow  perennially  from  the 
earliest  recognition  of  the  fatherhood  and  mother¬ 
hood  that  imparted  them.  Many  of  these  determi¬ 
native  experiences  are  included  in  that  phase  of 
our  development  which  is  anticipated  in  the  dawn 
of  adolescence,  and  accomplished  when  we  attain 
manhood  or  womanhood.  From  its  demonstrations 
of  our  capacities  we  trace  out  our  normal  growths 
and  serviceable  tasks.  For  then  our  powers  awoke 
in  prophecies  which  we  cannot  disregard  without 
breaking  life  into  detached  futilities. 

So  the  united  life  of  humanity  should  renew  and 
guide  itself  from  the  Hellenic  attainment  of  hu¬ 
manity's  youth  and  entrance  to  manhood.  From 


64 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


65 


the  daybreak  of  Hellenic  humanism  we  project  the 
orbit  of  our  sun.  In  its  original  virilities  mankind 
may  be  forever  young.  We  would  not  revert  to  it, 
seeking  to  reinstate  outgrown  forms,  any  more  than 
the  individual  would  try  to  reconstruct  the  condi¬ 
tions  of  his  own  formative  period.  We  would  not 
disparage  the  centuries  between  us  and  Athens,  for 
they  increase  Hellenism’s  dominating  current  with 
waters  from  other  springs.  We  do  not  need  to 
idealize  the  life  of  ancient  Greece,  nor  to  condone  its 
incompleteness,  perversions,  recrudescences  of  bar¬ 
barism.  The  free  Hellenes  inhumanly  regarded 
only  themselves  as  really  human.  Yet,  despite  such 
glaring  contradictions  of  humanism,  Hellenism  was 
the  awakening  of  the  human  spirit,  man’s  discov¬ 
ery  of  himself.  It  directs  forever  humanity’s  un¬ 
folding,  inspires  the  universal  historic  task.  Hel¬ 
lenism  is  humanism  in  the  first  clear  self-discovery 
of  the  impulse  to  subordinate  all  things  to  the 
human,  to  center  all  things  in  the  human. 


The  fundamental  impression  received  from  Hel¬ 
lenism  is  of  that  repose  which  is  mastery  of  self 
and  task,  humanism’s  self-possession.  It  is  this 
which  compels  our  admiration,  rebukes  our  fret, 
uncertainty,  formlessness. 

The  symbols  of  Hellenism  are  the  calm  brows  and 
majestic  limbs  of  sculptured  gods  and  heroes.  The 
genius  that  conceived  them  and  the  perfect  crafts¬ 
manship  that  formed  them  possess  their  repose. 
Here  is  no  vagueness  of  an  elusive  thought  strug- 


66  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

gling  for  an  expression  which  is  only  an  uncertain 
intimation.  The  artist's  interfused  conception  and 
execution,  attained  by  whatever  toils  and  pains,  are, 
in  the  final  attainment  and  impression,  direct,  un¬ 
erring,  clearly  conscious  of  that  which  is  to  be  told 
and  of  the  way  to  tell  it.  This  great,  strong  rest¬ 
fulness  of  creative  genius  is  radiant  in  Hellenic  art, 
philosophy,  practical  achievement,  manners,  life. 
It  excludes  everything  alien,  superfluous.  Each 
work  becomes  distinct  and  complete  in  its  own  sym¬ 
metrical  simplicity.  Mutually  related  creations  at¬ 
tain  the  same  impression  in  their  combinations,  as 
the  statue  of  Pallas  and  the  enshrining  Parthenon, 
or  as  protagonist  and  chorus  in  a  drama's  unity. 
In  each  element  and  in  the  whole,  there  is  no  dis¬ 
tracting  intrusion,  nor  any  deficiency  which  the 
spectator  must  disturb  himself  to  supply.  These 
revelations  proclaim  that  human  life  must  be  dis¬ 
tinct  and  complete,  self-possessed  without  excess  or 
defect  or  disharmony. 

This  satisfying  reposeful  completeness  is  the  soul 
of  Hellenic  beauty.  In  barbarian  lands  our  hearts 
are  homesick  for  that  beauty.  Fortunate  are  the 
hours  when  we  can  pass  from  our  distorted  pover¬ 
ties  and  superfluities  into  its  peace  of  clarity  and 
grace,  summoned  thither  by  a  luminous  sentence  of 
Greek  reflection,  by  an  exactly  expressed  phrase  of 
poetic  sentiment,  by  a  sculptured  line  that  separates 
perfectness  from  excess  or  defect.  From  these  we 
may  bring  into  common  work-days  the  essential  of 
the  Greek’s  beautiful  reposefulness,  the  exquisite 
secret  of  his  peace,  the  self-possession  of  the  human. 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


67 


Our  age  knows  so  little  of  inward  peace  that  we 
distinguish  its  kinds  imperfectly.  There  is  no 
peace  in  our  lust  of  things,  neither  when  we  have 
gained  them,  nor  when  we  distractedly  pursue 
them,  nor  when,  exhausted  in  a  vain  endeavor,  we 
sink  into  inertia.  Of  the  great  historic  kinds,  one 
is  the  separative  peace  which  withdraws  from  ob¬ 
jects,  calling  them  illusions.  This  flows  into  Nir¬ 
vana.  There  is  the  transcendent  peace  found  in 
Christianity,  where  the  conscious  antagonism  to 
the  supreme  holiness  has  been  calmed  by  the  forgiv¬ 
ing  grace  of  God,  and  there  is  peace  with  God  and 
with  all  things  that  he  wills.  Omitting  other  types 
and  variations  of  these  types,  for  enough  has  been 
instanced  for  comparison,  there  is  the  Hellenic  in¬ 
ward  peace,  which,  harmonizing  all  human  powers 
in  the  republic  of  the  soul,  accomplishes  ever  en¬ 
larging  tasks  with  calm  mastery. 

Strain  and  fret  so  characterize  present  activi¬ 
ties,  and  their  vacillating  desires,  that  repose  may 
mean  to  us  absence  of  action.  The  Hellenic  repose 
is  action  conscious  of  its  aim,  of  inward  powers  suf¬ 
ficient  to  attain  it,  and  of  the  instruments  that  must 
be  used.  Hellenic  humanism  takes  exact  account  of 
the  things  which  must  be  subordinated  to  the  hu¬ 
man.  Its  accurate  objectivity  is  an  element  of  its 
clear  self-consciousness.  The  Greek,  with  his  clear 
conceptions  of  the  work  to  be  done,  faced  the  things 
which  entered  into  his  work  with  steady  mind  and 
fearless  heart.  Unlike  the  Hindu,  he  would  not 
evade  them.  To  try  to  evade  them  is  supinely  to 
yield  to  them  in  their  inexorable  encounters.  Un- 


63  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

like  his  Persian  contemporary  and  our  own  a ge  of 
physical  science,  he  would  not  serve  things  by  seek¬ 
ing  his  satisfaction  in  them.  He  appropriated  them 
for  instruments  of  the  soul’s  task.  The  sculptured 
symbols  of  Hellenism  are  not  withdrawn  from  the 
world  of  things.  They  are  either  in  action  or  ready 
to  act,  conscious  of  their  power,  or  resting  after 
action,  in  the  satisfaction  of  work  done.  Their 
faces  are  perceptive  or  reflective;  not  introverted, 
as  in  the  image  of  a  Buddha,  nor  ecstatic,  like  the 
paintings  of  Christian  saints.  The  Hellenic  repose 
is  in  and  of  the  Hellenic  task,  which  is  the  task  of 
humanism. 

In  this  task,  the  soul  that  subordinates  things 
must  organize  itself.  The  lower  faculties  must  be 
ranged  under  the  sway  of  the  higher.  The  body 
must  be  made  the  mind’s  adequate  instrument  and 
expression.  Alien  to  Hellenism  were  those  Jewish 
confusions  of  the  spiritual  and  the  physical  which 
to  this  day  degrade  the  Christian  hope  of  the  here¬ 
after.  Through  the  body  must  be  continued  the 
mind’s  ordering,  subordinating  process.  This  re¬ 
poseful  mastery  is  splendidly  realized  amid  external 
turmoils.  The  wild  steeds  rear  and  plunge,  but 
with  calm  self-possession  the  charioteer  directs 
their  onrush.  This  reposeful  concentration  is  evi¬ 
dent  amid  the  clash  of  arms,  the  fury  of  slaughter. 
The  barbarian  rabble  scream  themselves  frantic  in 
their  disorderly  charge  and  panic-stricken  flight. 
There  Achilles  is  the  self-collected  master  of  every 
tremendous  energy. 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


o9 


§  3* 

The  Hellenic  endeavor  to  accomplish  the  human 
task  in  reposeful  mastery  may  seem  to  be 
transcended  by  a  permanently  significant  movement 
in  Greek  philosophy,  extending,  though  with  an  in¬ 
terruption  equally  significant,  from  Thales  through 
the  Neo-platonists,  and  through  medieval  and  mod¬ 
ern  thought.  Unhumanistic  may  appear  the  initial 
attempts  to  account  for  all  things  by  water,  or  by 
fire,  or  by  the  atoms  and  the  void,  or  by  the  un¬ 
changing  One,  or  by  ceaseless  change.  When 
thought  advanced  to  seek  the  significance  of  reality 
in  thought,  and  the  Socratic  concept  was  developed 
into  a  conceptual  universe,  this  interpretation  of 
reality  seems  to  our  humanistic  criticism  to  absorb 
into  an  abstraction  all  the  variety  of  human  life. 
This  philosophy  appears  to  annul  human  interests 
by  dissociating  itself  from  the  content  of  men’s 
thought  and  act,  and  to  fix  the  untraversable  gulf 
between  the  transcendent  reality  and  the  world  of 
human  experience,  which  can  then  only  seem  to  be. 
When,  in  the  course  of  Greek  philosophy,  the  ava¬ 
lanches  of  intellectual  criticism,  ethical  failure,  and 
spiritual  confusion  swept  away  the  approaches  to 
that  chasm,  and  the  bridge  by  which  men  had  hoped 
to  cross  it  appeared  as  unsubstantial  as  the  rain¬ 
bow  that  spans  the  plunge  of  a  river  down  a  moun¬ 
tain  gorge,  then  a  flight  across  was  attempted  by 
mystic  ecstasy,  into  the  obliteration  of  all  that  con¬ 
stitutes  our  human  world.  Is  that  august  course 

♦If  any  reader  finds  himself  on  too  unfamiliar  ground  in  this 
section  of  this  chapter.  he  can  omit  without  losing  the  connection. 
I  have  been  careful  to  keep  this  section  distinct  from  the  others. 


70  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

of  speculation  the  retraction  of  humanistic  Hellen¬ 
ism  by  a  deeper  Hellenic  self-consciousness? 

The  negative  answer  to  this  question  is  sug¬ 
gested,  when  we  view  this  movement  not  from  its 
medieval  and  modern  derivatives,  nor  from  ancient 
and  recent  criticisms,  but  from  its  own  impulse. 
The  beginnings  of  its  fundamental  reflection  were 
in  Greek  cities  which  stood  on  the  borders  of  the 
Hellenic  world.  In  these  city-states  an  alert  inter¬ 
est  arose,  to  reduce  to  order  in  thought  the  nature 
worship  of  neighboring  peoples,  and  their  associ¬ 
ated  conceptions,  including  those  of  maritime 
traders  who  imported  variations  of  the  immemorial 
lore  of  older  civilizations.  How  could  this  chaos  of 
naturalism  be  reduced  to  the  essentially  human 
orderliness  of  an  inclusive  principle?  It  was  in¬ 
evitable  that  these  thinkers  should  first  adopt  a 
naturalistic  principle,  since  they  were  affected  by 
the  traditionally  naturalistic  cults  of  their  own 
pantheon.  To  them  the  face  of  Phoebus  Apollo  was 
blurred  against  the  blazing  sun.  Poseidon  was  but 
lifting  his  head  from  the  waves.  Zeus  had  not  yet 
completed  his  throne  above  the  sky.  The  early 
Greek  philosophy,  like  the  religious  advance,  was  a 
movement  out  of  nature  into  mind.  It  was  inevit¬ 
able  that  a  physical  element  should  be  chosen  to 
explain  and  order  all  things.  But  it  was  implicitly 
intellectual,  inasmuch  as  that  element  was  used  as 
an  interpretive  and  organizing  principle.  The  ab¬ 
stractness  and  unanalyzed  formlessness  of  their 
succeeding  apprehensions  of  mind,  and  no  less  their 
divergence  into  a  more  developed  materialism. 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


71 


marked  equally  necessary  stages  of  progress  toward 
the  mastery  of  things  by  human  thought. 

With  Plato  it  is  necessary,  as  with  the  German 
idealists,  to  distinguish  his  appreciation  of  the 
human  from  the  conceptualism  by  which  he  sought 
to  interpret  the  ultimate  problems.  This  concep¬ 
tualism  grew  from  that  appreciation,  though  de¬ 
humanized  in  his  developments  of  it.  His  aim, 
his  passion,  was  the  same  as  his  master's:  the  ra¬ 
tional  ordering,  beautifying  and  noble  energizing 
of  human  life.  When  we  read  in  his  most  familiar 
passage  of  “beauty  only,  absolute,  simple,  and  ever¬ 
lasting,  without  diminution  and  without  increase 
or  any  change,"  such  beauty  may  be  judged  by  us  to 
be  inaccessible  to  any  concrete  object,  and  to  be 
itself  the  absence  of  beauty.  But  he  adds,  however 
inconsistently,  that  this  supernal  beauty  “is  im¬ 
parted  to  the  ever  growing  and  perishing  beauties 
of  all  other  things."  The  conceptualism  of  his 
transcendent  world  was  in  his  intent  the  comple¬ 
tion  of  human  life.  His  city  of  the  soul  was  the 
republic  of  harmoniously  living  men.  In  his  great 
competitor  the  chief  interest,  as  the  titles  of  Aris¬ 
totle's  writings  specify,  is  the  more  critical  and 
practical  ordering  of  human  life. 

When  we  translated  Plato  in  our  sophomore  year, 
we  children  of  the  Puritans  found  continued  in  a 
new  field  the  chief  excitement  of  our  early  Sunday- 
school  instruction.  We  delighted  in  the  victories  of 
Socratic  and  Platonic  light  over  the  benighted 
sophists,  as  we  had  reveled  in  the  sanguinary  tale 
of  pious  Joshua's  massacre  of  the  ill-deserving 


72  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Canaanites,  man,  woman,  child,  babe  and  beast. 
The  dialectical  annihilation  of  Protagoras  affected 
ns  hardly  less  pleasurably  than  the  disjecta  membra 
of  Agag,  hewed  in  pieces  before  the  Lord.  We  took 
Plato’s  word  and  the  professor’s  for  the  complete¬ 
ness  of  the  triumph.  We  gave  little  heed  to  the  sig¬ 
nificance  of  a  movement  mightily  pervasive  of  the 
Hellenic  world,  akin  to  its  rival  in  the  passion  to 
rationalize,  beautify,  and  ennoble  life. 

From  the  humanism  common  to  both  was  devel¬ 
oped  the  deeply  ethical,  broadly  practical  type  of 
the  Hellenism  which  dismissed  the  attempt  to  blend 
human  reality  with  a  transcendent  imagining. 
Though  fallen  on  evil  days,  the  Stoic  and  those  with 
whom  he  disputed  bent  serene,  intense  brows  upon 
the  task  of  making  the  human  the  best  that  it  might 
become.  This  ripely  representative  Greek  thought, 
finding  beneath  the  human  that  which  is  intract¬ 
able,  acknowledges  in  matter  an  irrational  resid¬ 
uum  ;  and  also  confessing  that  the  inmost  secret  of 
the  universe  is  untraceable,  reverently  withdraws 
from  things  too  high;  and  between  the  abyss  and 
the  summit  organizes,  within  farflung  boundaries, 
which  ever  expand  downward  and  upward,  the  ex¬ 
quisitely  penetrated  world  of  rational  satisfactions, 
intellectual  harmonies,  a  life  free,  rich,  beautiful, 
of  well-ordered,  self-restrained  buoyancy  of  soul. 

The  transcendent  aspirations  with  which  Plato 
strove  to  infuse  human  affairs  were  revived  in  the 
face  of  unhellenic  contents  of  life.  In  Neoplatonism 
the  humanistic  Hellenic  spirit  can  still  be  traced,  as 
it  seeks  vainly  to  recover  its  lost  values  by  the 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


73 


transference  of  the  spirit  into  another  world.  Plo¬ 
tinus  and  his  associates  found,  as  in  Kant’s  Hellenic 
symbol,  that  the  element  that  retards  the  flight  of 
thought  is  necessary  to  sustain  it.  Here,  as  in  all 
the  failures  of  Hellenism’s  magnificent  endeavor,  is 
the  growing  consciousness  of  a  task  too  great  for 
Hellenic  powers.  The  pathos  of  disappointment 
deepens  the  significance  of  Hellenic  humanism. 

§4 

The  Hellenic  attitude  toward  the  physical  world 
was  not  our  attempt  to  attain  the  scientific  mastery 
of  the  physical  for  physical  needs.  Nor  did  nature 
declare  to  the  Greek  the  glory  of  a  superhuman 
God.  The  conception  was  not  strange  to  him  of 

“A  motion  and  a  spirit  that  impels 
All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought, 

And  rolls  through  all  things,” 

Yet,  when  we  encounter  cosmic  pantheism  in  Greek 
thought,  its  finest  development  subserved  ethical 
purposes.”  More  congenial  to  him  was  the  thought 
of  nature  as  either  the  minister  and  adornment  of 
human  life,  or  its  companionable  reflection.  We 
boast  that  our  conceptions  of  nature  are  better, 
whether  scientific,  religious,  or  romantic.  The 
romantically  pantheistic  mood  imagines  itself  to  be 
an  original  discovery  of  the  deepest  that  nature  is. 
But  these  complacencies  may  find  that  his  intuitions 
are  necessary  for  any  insight  of  ours,  and  that 
some  paths  out  from  Hellenism  must  be  retraced. 

When  we  assume  superiority  to  the  Greek’s  de¬ 
ficiency  in  physical  science  and  invention,  it  may  be 


74  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

profitable  to  recall  two  things,  already  referred  to 
in  the  preceding  chapter.  One  is,  that  the  mathe¬ 
matical  key  of  physical  science  is  of  his  forging, 
though  we,  with  inferior  scientific  genius,  have  un¬ 
locked  with  it  many  treasure-houses  unknown  to 
him.  The  other  reflection  is,  that  we  have  fancied 
it  to  be  the  key  to  reality,  whereas  he  knew  that  its 
purpose  is  to  exploit  the  physical  for  the  human 
soul. 

Our  achievement  in  scientific  invention  is  our 
most  obvious  advantage  over  Hellas.  But  this  does 
not  necessarily  imply  superiority  in  any  of  the 
higher  faculties.  Inventions,  when  one  has  the  Hel¬ 
lenic  key,  axe  due  largely  to  favorable  economic 
conditions.  Without  these,  clearest  thought  and 
consummate  craftsmanship  lack  field  and  motive. 
Inventions  belong  among  the  more  mechanical  his¬ 
toric  developments,  which  are  distinguishable  from 
the  spiritual,  the  essentially  human  forces  of  ad¬ 
vance. 

The  annals  of  invention  are  indeed  full  of  spirit¬ 
ual  achievements,  such  as  indomitable  patience, 
self-denial,  concentration  upon  a  beneficent  aim, 
compassionate  devotion  to  human  welfare.  Here 
also  is  incentive  for  the  soul.  But  the  power  that 
does  the  inventing  is  of  the  more  mechanic  range. 
The  inventive  faculty  may  be  less  related  to  other 
faculties  than  others.  It  may  be  in  ludicrous  isola¬ 
tion.  Of  the  higher  forces  the  most  prodigious  in¬ 
ventor  may  be  destitute,  and  the  age  of  most  daz¬ 
zling  inventive  triumphs.  These  may  be  won  at  the 
expense  of  our  real  selves.  Their  great  sendee 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


75 


indeed  is  to  set  the  human  spirit  free  from  limita¬ 
tions,  that  it  may  pursue  higher  tasks.  But  they 
may  bind  the  spirit  with  heavier  chains.  Our  in¬ 
ventive  triumphs  might  well  appear  to  the  Greek 
an  offering  to  the  inferior  gods.  The  classic  human¬ 
ism,  though  historic  conditions  led  it  to  grant  its 
privileges  to  free  Hellenes  only,  wrould  have  rejected 
our  mechanizations  of  human  labor  for  men  who 
call  themselves  free,  our  sordidness  of  accompany¬ 
ing  social  conditions,  our  prostitution  of  human 
powers  to  idols  beneath  Apollo's  scorn.  The  Greeks, 
if  faithful  to  their  genius,  would  not  have  separated 
themselves  from  nature  by  enormous  piles  and  holes 
that  defile  earth  and  air,  nor  surround  themselves 
with  cities,  in  a  meaning  so  different  from  their 
idea  of  the  city.  If  led  to  the  brink  of  the  inventive 
age,  the  Greek  spirit  would  pause  to  count  the 
human  cost,  to  assert  the  human  aim,  and  then 
would  advance  clear-eyed  and  confident  of  ability 
direct  mechanical  tasks  to  human  ends.  What 
the  Greek  invented  ministered  to  the  beauty  and 
order  of  life.  Here  he  showed  consummate  skill. 
We  need  to  learn  of  him  what  kinds  of  things  to 
make,  and  what  use  to  make  of  them. 

The  Greek's  scientific  curiosity  was  subordinated 
to  intellectual  processes,  as  well  as  to  ideal  aims. 
This  habit  may  check  for  awhile  the  course  of  phys¬ 
ical  science,  but  it  develops  mind  and  soul  for  all 
subsequent  victories  over  the  physical  world.  In 
the  pathetically  short  time  allotted  to  his  inde¬ 
pendent  career,  he  laid  the  foundations  of  mathe¬ 
matic,  logic,  fundamental  thinking;  of  an  ethic  by 


76  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

which  he  strove  to  live  superior  to  fate;  of  an 
aesthetic  which  our  dull  appreciations  fail  to  re¬ 
cover,  and  in  which  were  involved  exquisite  prac¬ 
tical  applications,  as  in  architecture,  worked  out  as 
far  as  was  required  by  beauty,  impressiveness,  and 
adaptability  to  high  uses;  of  unmatched  speech  in 
prose  and  verse;  of  a  political  science,  to  whose 
fundamental  principles  mankind  has  only  recently 
begun  to  grope  back.  All  his  science  turns  man- 
ward,  into  art  for  life's  sake.  When  we  praise 
ourselves  that  our  attainments  in  physical  science 
are  so  superior  to  his,  we  may  also  reflect  that  it  is 
by  his  development  of  mind  that  we  have  become 
able  to  study  nature.  When  from  our  knowledge  of 
nature  we  learn  more  of  mind,  this  also  is  derived 
from  him.  And  we  still  have  to  learn  life  in  the 
world,  and  the  life  of  the  world,  from  his  discover¬ 
ies  of  soul. 

His  irony,  a  trait  of  intellectual  clarity,  would 
have  rejoiced  in  our  belated  discovery  that  our 
time's  devotion  to  physical  science  has  brought  us 
to  no  final  knowledge  of  reality.  We  have  learned 
to  exploit  a  little  of  the  world  for  our  lower  needs. 
We  have  formulated  a  superficial  aspect  of  it.  Our 
processes,  erring  in  their  incompleteness,  have  tried 
to  mechanize  the  vital,  to  divide  the  indivisible,  to 
tear  to  shreds  the  garment  woven  without  seam. 
To  formulate  and  manipulate  a  reflection  of  nature 
by  a  mechanically  intellectual  cleverness  is  not 
knowledge  nor  possession.  When  Hephaistos,  the 
lame  artificer,  attempts  to  serve  the  Olympian  ban¬ 
quet,  inextinguishable  laughter  rocks  the  assembly 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


77 


of  the  gods.  It  would  be  too  grave  a  jest  if  the 
arduous  course  of  our  physical  science  should  limit 
us  to  incidental  conveniences,  provisional  concep¬ 
tions,  and  fail  to  become  an  element  of  real  knowl¬ 
edge  and  thought  and  life.  In  order  to  minister  to 
these  higher  ends  it  must  associate  itself,  in  a  sub¬ 
ordinate  capacity,  with  a  more  deeply  human  inter¬ 
pretation  of  the  world.  The  masters  of  our  physical 
science  are  pleading  with  us  to  learn  reality  in 
essentially  Hellenic  ways,  and  to  organize  scientific 
procedure  in  the  light  of  this  knowledge.  For  the 
Greek  knew  that  the  world  was  alive,  and  he  was 
on  his  way  to  know  its  vital  unity. 

The  Greek  possessed  nature  by  knowing  his  own 
soul.  Who  shall  guide  us  to  greet  the  world  with 
his  sense  of  companionship?  We  may  guess  that 
nature  was  to  him  what  a  radiant  night  is  to  us, 
when  we  discern,  in  her  perfect  place  in  a  perfect 
frame,  like  a  great  cameo  seen  through  a  mist,  the 
lady  of  the  moon — pale,  pure  face,  gleaming  bosom, 
luminous  hair  billowed  by  celestial  winds;  and  she 
is  the  charm  and  glory  of  the  night.  Such  as  the 
skies  are  in  her  regency,  we  may  suppose  the  sea  to 
have  been  to  those  who  heard  its  whispers  and  thun¬ 
ders  as  voices  of  a  human  song;  and  mountain 
woodlands  disclosed  to  them,  in  plays  and  shiftings 
of  form  and  color,  glimpses  of  human  grace. 
Nothing  of  the  rich  variety  of  the  music  and  the 
vision  is  lost  when  reflection  passes  on  to  the  human 
unity  in  which  they  are.  Shall  we  ever  return 
thither,  to  press  on  from  his  insight  into  spiritual 


78  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

deepening^  of  that  companionship?  Or  is  human¬ 
ity,  grown  old,  doomed  to  lament  always : 

“It  is  not  now  as  it  hath  been  of  yore ; 

Turn  wheresoe’er  I  may 

By  night  or  day, 

The  things  which  I  have  seen  I  now  can  see  no  more?” 

§  5 

Beautifully  expressive  of  Hellenic  humanism 
were  fair  cities’  festivals,  with  their  dancing  forms, 
and  with  music  of  another  genius  than  ours.  In  our 
land  the  dance  is  regarded  as  at  best  an  unessential 
addition  to  life.  It  is  either  clumsily  inartistic,  or 
else  is  an  exotic  art,  as  still  generally  on  the  stage. 
Exotic,  but  not  artistic,  is  the  waning  craze  of  un¬ 
couth  imitations  from  savages.  Few  of  our  dances 
— but  those  few  are  beautiful — come  from  the  life 
of  the  people,  except  among  our  Negroes,  Indians 
and  immigrants.  In  this  respect — and  other  re¬ 
spects — European  peasantries  are  far  more  Hel¬ 
lenic  than  we.  To  the  Greek,  the  dance  was  the 
successful  endeavor  to  make  orderly,  stately,  beau¬ 
tiful,  the  personal  and  social  manifestations  of  the 
human  through  its  impersonator,  the  human  body. 

His  dance  expressed  the  sensuous  as  it  expressed 
other  impulses,  distinctly,  separately,  in  its  place 
and  measure.  There  was  no  tendency,  until  the 
Hellenic  decadence,  to  make  the  sensuous  pervasive. 
The  dance  was  universally  human  in  its  range, 
whether  decorously  conducted  by  the  Muse  of 
tragedy,  or  whirled  along  by  the  wild  Maenads. 

Viewing  Hellenic  life  as  dance,  we  must  listen  to 
it  as  music.  We  enter  only  a  little  way  into  the 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


79 


Greek's  thought  and  action  if  we  forget  that  he 
filled  his  life  with  music,  set  life  to  music.  To  him 
it  did  not  speak  “of  that  which  we  have  not  seen 
and  shall  never  see."  It  had  no  pinions  to  mount 
above  experience.  Its  spirit  is  not  akin  to  that 
union  of  Christian  aspiration  and  Gothic  mystery 
which  is  the  consummation  of  our  supreme  art, 
though  our  expressive  harmonies  are  derived  from 
the  Greek  sense  of  form.  His  music  was  for  life 
to  dance  to.  As  grace  and  exhilaration  of  human 
life  not  seeking  to  transcend  itself,  this  art,  as  we 
may  judge  from  its  effects  and  relations,  ap¬ 
proached  perfection  in  its  kind. 

The  dance  and  music  of  the  festival  were  in  honor 
of  the  gods.  But  their  gods  were  expressive  of  the 
human.  All  the  more  because  of  the  religious  con¬ 
secration  were  dance  and  music  expressive  of 
humanity,  in  clear  and  buoyant  feeling  of  its  own 
worth,  beauty,  symmetry,  effectiveness  for  the 
human  task.  Is  there  any  religious  influence  to  be 
derived  from  that  self-consciousness? 

Whatever  we  may  learn  from  Hellenism  concern¬ 
ing  the  humanizing  of  the  objects  of  faith  must  be 
derived  from  the  Hellenic  religion  in  its  genuine¬ 
ness,  not  from  that  syncretism  to  which  we  super¬ 
ficially  impute  an  Hellenic  influence  upon  the  early 
developments  of  Christianity.  This  influence  has 
not  been  exaggerated,  except  by  a  few,  but  it  has 
been  misnamed.  In  our  New  Testaments  we  read 
Greek  words,  but  not  Greek  sentences.  The  same 
may  be  said  of  most  of  the  “Greek  fathers."  We 
find  much  metaphysic  of  a  sort  in  Pauline  and 


80  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Johannine  writings  and  their  successors,  but  not 
genuine  Greek  philosophy.  Gnosticism  and  mystery 
cults  affected  Christianity  mightily,  but  not  with  a 
purely  Hellenic  consciousness.  There  wmre  Hellenic 
mystery  cults,  but  they  are  to  be  distinguished  from 
the  so-called  Hellenic  mystery  religions,  which 
rivaled  and  affected  Christianity.  That  mingled 
flood  of  unregulated  speculation,  superstition,  char¬ 
latanry,  effeminate  faddism,  bewildered  agony  of 
spiritual  struggle,  aspiration,  insight,  was  one  of 
the  mightiest  of  the  decadent  movements  of  reli¬ 
gious  history.  Christianity  was  safeguarded  from 
complete  conquest  by  the  historic  supremacy  of  its 
founder.  This  movement  contained  Hellenism  as 
water  contains  hydrogen,  which  in  water  is  no 
longer  hydrogen.  Not  that  the  authentic  Hellenism 
had  passed  from  the  earth.  It  continued  essentially 
apart  from  that  unhellenic  bewilderment,  through 
Constantine’s  barbarous  betrayal,  and  even  until 
our  forefathers  from  the  north  trampled  it  into  the 
ground,  to  become  the  seed  of  a  remote  harvest. 
But  it  was  not  by  this  survival  that  the  Christianity 
of  the  Roman  Empire  was  deeply  influenced. 
Though  we  trace  the  Hellenic  spirit  in  the  alien 
content  of  Neoplatonism,  it  was  not  that  Hellenic 
survival  which  deeply  affected  the  Christian  faith. 
The  historic  creeds  of  Christendom  are  far  from 
being  purely  Christian.  But  when  we  call  them 
Hellenic,  we  give  them  an  undeserved  honor.  If  a 
meeting-place  of  thought  and  life  and  aspiration 
may  be  discovered  for  Greek  and  Christian,  it  must 
be  for  the  Greek  of  Athene’s  fostering  and  for  the 
Christian  who  is  in  the  direct  discipleship  of  Jesus. 


' 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  81 

The  Greek’s  worship  of  the  “fair  humanities”  is 
not  superficiality  in  religion,  nor  an  episode  in 
men’s  search  for  God.  It  is  not  a  bypath  ending 
at  the  castle  of  despair.  It  is  not  a  superstition, 
which  must  fade  away  before  the  revelation  of 
superhuman  deity.  It  is  the  attempt  to  humanize 
religion.  Shortcomings  and  perversities  may  be 
due,  not  so  much  to  a  deficient  consciousness  of  the 
supernatural  and  superhuman,  as  to  the  imperfect 
apprehension  of  the  human — necessarily  incomplete 
in  so  early  an  endeavor.  It  may  be  possible  to  dis¬ 
cover  within  this  incompleteness  a  power  which  can 
impel  our  inherited  humanism  toward  spiritual  con¬ 
summations. 

In  Greece,  as  nearly  everywhere,  religion  lagged 
behind  other  developments.  For  religion,  with  few7 
exceptions,  does  not  lead  on,  but  it  holds  back.  This 
is  due  in  part  to  the  rigidity  of  cult  and  creed,  and 
to  priestly  interests  in  things  established.  But  a 
deeper  reason  is,  that  religion  hesitantly  forms  its 
changes  from  secular  developments,  historic  move¬ 
ments,  social  awakenings.  This  is  shown  nowhere 
more  plainly  than  in  the  religion  of  Israel,  culmi¬ 
nating  in  the  great  prophet  of  humanity.  In  su¬ 
preme  moments  these  developments  converge  into 
a  mighty  spiritual  passion,  which  then  becomes 
leadership  of  all  human  interests,  in  a  great  prophet 
and  in  the  fellowship  which  he  inspires.  No  such 
epoch  is  found  in  the  pathetically  brief  period  when 
Hellenism  was  unhampered  by  alien  intrusions.  Its 
advancing  humanism  in  other  elements  of  life  far 
outstripped  its  worship  and  faith. 


82  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

The  Hellenic  gods  were  not  too  human :  they  were 
not  human  enough.  In  their  short  life-time  of 
men's  vital  faith  in  them  they  could  only  partially 
outgrow  the  physical  forms  from  which  they  origi¬ 
nated.  Only  the  supreme  artists,  and  those  capable 
of  receiving  their  vision,  conceived  them  as  dis¬ 
tinctively  human,  and  even  they  as  incompletely 
human.  The  reflective  brows  of  the  Phidian  Zeus 
might  be  pondering  the  unclean  numina  from  wrhich 
he  had  been  spawned  so  recently.  Athene  of  the 
Parthenon  was  almost  within  hearing  of  the  shrieks 
of  human  victims  in  her  Arcadian  shrines.  The 
Dionysos  who  inspired  the  perfectness  of  Athenia* 
tragedy  was  reminded  even  there  of  his  brutish 
shapes  and  rites  obscene.  The  gods,  emerging  from 
the  physical  and  animal,  did  indeed  draw  nature  up 
with  them,  in  man's  apprehension  of  nature.  The 
growth  of  these  humanizations  both  of  nature  and 
of  man's  life  in  it,  is  one  of  the  most  fascinating  of 
studies.  It  was  inevitable  that  animal  passions 
should  cling  to  their  incompletely  humanized  con¬ 
ceptions  of  deity :  for,  the  Greek  might  ask,  are  not 
these  passions  natural  to  man?  It  is  a  similar 
phenomenon  when  wrrath  and  vengeance  are  stiH 
attributed  to  the  Jahveh  of  the  Arabian  marauder, 
even  in  the  faith  of  modern  Christendom.  The  al¬ 
ternative  would  seem  to  the  Greek  to  dehumanize 
the  thought  of  the  divine,  either  by  its  lapse  into 
physical  nature,  or  by  the  fading  out  of  the  god* 
into  vague  abstractions.  When  great  thinkers  tried 
to  unify  the  thought  of  God,  they  found  the  ele¬ 
ments  of  religious  faith  too  little  developed  for  their 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


83 


undertaking.  The  Hellenic  humanism  was  in  nearly 
all  respects  an  interrupted  task  which  we  must 
complete:  in  religion  it  was  left  the  most  incom¬ 
plete.  All  the  more  urgent,  then,  is  our  task,  to 
work  out  and  unify  the  spiritual  humanizations 
which  they  began,  which  they  inspire. 

Other  undeniable  imperfections  of  Hellenic  spir¬ 
ituality,  such  as  a  deficient  sense  of  sin,  of  holiness, 
of  regeneration,  were,  as  our  further  reflection  may 
find,  not  because  their  gods  were  too  human,  but 
because  of  the  incompleteness  of  their  humanity. 
Whether  clearer  humanizations  of  the  thought  of 
God  can  deepen  sufficiently  the  essentials  of  spir¬ 
itual  life,  we  wrill  inquire  later.  It  may  be  found 
that  the  Greek  conception  of  the  humanness  of 
deity,  confused  though  it  was,  is  among  the  chief 
historic  values  of  the  spiritual  consciousness. 

§  6 

The  soul’s  reposeful  mastery  of  the  human  task, 
the  genial  companionship  of  nature,  the  humanness 
of  the  divine — these  three  aspects  of  Hellenism  give 
us  essentials  of  man,  the  world,  and  God.  They  are 
mighty  stimulations  of  our  reviving  humanistic  en¬ 
deavor,  to  subdue  all  things  to  the  human,  to  center 
all  things  in  the  human.  The  inspiration  is  all  the 
greater  because  the  Greek,  in  his  tragically  short 
period  of  free  self-development,  found  the  under¬ 
taking  too  great.  Reposeful  mastery  proved  to  be 
ideal,  not  attainment.  There  was  the  brooding 
consciousness  that  his  work  must  be  left  unachieved. 
Over  Achilles’  plumed  helm  hovers  the  shadow  of 


84  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

untimely  death.  To  build  in  a  few  short  years  the 
human  universe,  with  materials  which  the  Hellenic 
genius  must  itself  transform  from  mud  and  slime, 
against  monstrous  consolidations  confronting  him 
and  new  destructive  powers  fast  forming  to  over¬ 
whelm  him,  was  a  work  beyond  hope  of  accomplish¬ 
ment.  It  is  enough  for  our  grateful  praise  if,  under 
such  conditions,  the  nature  of  the  task  was  discov¬ 
ered,  for  later  ages  to  develop,  with  additional  ener¬ 
gies.  Not  the  least  incentive  of  our  loyalty  to 
Hellenism  is  its  tragedy. 

It  was  the  Greek's  political  failure  that  involved 
the  most  poignant  consciousness  of  universal  defeat. 
For  he  shared  the  antique  conviction  of  the  suprem¬ 
acy  of  the  state,  as  inclusive  of  every  human  inter¬ 
est,  and  with  final  right  over  each  individual  right. 
In  the  state,  thus  revered,  he  desired  that  every 
individual  capacity  should  be  fulfilled,  and  the 
supreme  will  discovered  in  the  unity  of  self-govern¬ 
ing  citizens.  This  was  the  form  in  which  Hellenic 
humanism  sought  to  work  out  its  noblest  aspiration, 
its  social  consciousness.  This  socialized  humanism 
was  to  him  the  consummate  ideal,  the  fundamental 
principle,  the  pervasive  spirit  and  energy  of  his 
growing  human  universe.  Whatever  causes  are  al¬ 
leged  for  the  Hellenic  decline  (and  it  is  now  the 
fashion  for  each  specialist  to  locate  the  sufficient 
cause  in  his  own  specialty,  however  restricted)  the 
Greek  reduced  the  causes  to  the  failure  of  that 
which  he  considered  fundamental,  pervasive,  ideal. 

When  the  state  failed,  as  it  was  continually  fail¬ 
ing,  through  the  inherited  omissions  of  essential 


HELLENIC  SOURCE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


85 


elements,  the  selfish  corruptions  of  democracy,  the 
various  usurpations  of  tyranny,  interminable  strife 
between  cities  and  of  factions  in  each  city,  through 
a  forced  consolidation,  whose  conquest  of  the  East 
proved  to  be  a  further  Hellenic  disintegration,  and 
through  the  Roman  conquests,  this  continuous  po¬ 
litical  defeat  was  to  the  Hellene  the  increasing 
overwhelming  of  humanity  by  inhuman  powers. 
Under  the  thickening  shadow,  death  became  more 
than  the  doom  of  individuals  and  generations.  It 
was  the  extinction  of  the  Hellenic  ideal,  the  destruc¬ 
tion  of  human  ambitions.  Stronger  than  they  are 
necessity  and  fate,  aloof,  impassive,  implacable. 
The  Athenian  tragic  drama  has  all  Hellas  for  its 
chorus.  This  is  the  crown  of  sorrows,  that  the 
human  in  its  mightiest  consciousness  of  excellence 
is  arrayed  against  invincible  powers. 

§7 

Our  present  civilization  is  heir  of  all  ages  and 
climes — though  other  civilizations  or  barbarisms 
may  be  our  heirs.  To  limit  our  wealth  to  the  Hel¬ 
lenic  inheritance  would  be  least  Hellenic.  But  as 
great  a  loss  would  be  incurred  if  we  should  fail  in 
the  Hellenic  organization  of  these  other  wealths. 
The  larger  our  appropriations  of  other  inheritances, 
the  greater  is  our  need  of  Hellenic  humanism. 

One  of  the  applications  of  this  reflection  is  to 
that  region  which  we  of  Western  Europe  and  Amer¬ 
ica  have  traversed  along  our  historic  course.  Our 
path  dipped  from  sunny,  genial  Hellenic  heights, 
into  the  Gothic  forest,  cavernous,  abysmal,  perilous, 


86  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

demon-haunted ;  from  the  appropriation  of  the 
world  by  the  human  soul  to  intractable  suppress¬ 
ions;  and  from  the  attempted  mastery  of  all  things 
by  the  human  to  the  absolute  mastery  of  the  human 
by  the  ruler  of  all  things  and  all  souls,  the  inscrut¬ 
able  mystery,  the  supernatural  and  superhuman 
God. 

Yet  the  Gothic  consciousness  is  a  vast  enlarge¬ 
ment  of  our  world.  No  bounds  shut  off  any  realm 
of  emotion  and  longing.  Here  are  the  most  signifi¬ 
cant  expressions  of  music,  and  here  is  that  which 
the  greatest  music  confessess  to  be  inexpressible. 
Here  are  floods  of  the  heart,  deep,  passionate, 
tumultuous.  Here  are  terrible  premonitions  of 
death  and  of  what  may  be  beyond  death.  Here  are 
radiances  of  the  supernal  hope,  the  beatific  vision, 
the  eternally  towering  ecstasy.  Here  is  contrite 
reverence  for  all  high  things  and  their  august  sym¬ 
bols,  with  agonizing  repentance,  utter  self-abnega¬ 
tion,  rapture  of  redemption. 

At  the  entrance  of  this  domain  the  challenge  con¬ 
fronts  us:  shall  the  human  spirit  suffer  itself  to  be 
overwhelmed,  or  shall  it  still  advance,  chastened, 
renewed,  and  equipped  with  powers  which  Hellas 
did  not  know?  The  conviction  that  all  things  must 
be  subdued  to  the  human,  centered  in  the  human, 
should  be  intensified  with  the  enlarging  of  every 
human  scope  and  task.  Everything  that  encounters 
us  from  every  age  and  clime  arouses  the  human  to 
larger  efforts.  Every  mystery  reveals  that  the 
deepest  of  all  mysteries  is  the  human  soul. 


V 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE* 

Accept  those ,  Christ,  as  wholly  thine, 

Who  seek  Thee  by  the  shepherds’  sign; 

They  find  Thee  in  each  little  child, 

They  find  Thee  in  each  mother’s  care, 

Where  pain  has  sobbed ,  and  love  has  smiled, 

And  grateful  faith  lifts  up  faint  hands  of  prayer . 
Thou  who  art  present  everywhere 
In  common  things  of  highest  ivorth, 

Descend  to  us,  in  lowly  birth, 

Cleanse  Thou  the  hearts  by  pride  and  scorn  defiled, 
And  make  of  us  Thy  manger,  Lord  Christ-child. 

§1 

NOT  from  Hellenic  springs  alone  must  our 
age  be  humanized,  though  we  include  con¬ 
tributory  springs  from  other  sources, 
which  are  swept  into  the  main  current.  Our  hu¬ 
manism  flows  also  from  the  hills  of  Galilee.  Its 
purer,  nobler  origin  is  Jesus,  the  supreme  humanist. 

Rut  what  part  has  humanism  in  him,  whom  we 
•onceive  to  be  the  most  religious  of  teachers,  the 
most  devoted  to  God,  the  most  absorbed  in  the  di- 

<1  acknowledge  very  gratefully  the  courtesy  of  tlie  editor  of  The 
Journal  of  IReligion  for  permitting  me  the  use  of  this  chapter,  which 
was  published  in  the  first  number  of  The  Journal  of  Religion,  sub¬ 
stantially  as  given  here.  It  was  written  for  this  book,  and  its  pub¬ 
lication  as  an  article  was  an  afterthought.  It  tinds  now  the  place 
f*r  which  it  was  intended. 


87 


88 


THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


vine  will?  Was  there  any  tendency  in  him  to  sub¬ 
ordinate  all  things  to  the  human,  to  center  them  in 
the  human?  While  this  challenge  is  left  to  be  an¬ 
swered  later,  attention  is  called  here  to  essentials  in 
the  teaching,  ministry  and  personality  of  Jesus, 
which  profoundly  affect  modern  humanism. 

But  is  not  this  influence  due  to  a  misunderstand¬ 
ing  of  him?55'  Our  hopes  of  finding  in  him  solutions 
of  the  human  problems  which  our  civilization  must 
solve  or  perish  are  met  by  the  fact  that  his  teach¬ 
ings  have  reference  to  the  kingdom  of  God,  which, 
as  he  conceived  it,  is  not  to  be  obtained  by  historic 
progress,  but  is  to  descend  suddenly  from  heaven  in 
divine  power.  The  short  interval,  which  he  ex¬ 
pected  between  his  announcement  that  the  king¬ 
dom  is  at  hand  and  its  catastrophic  inauguration, 
was  not  to  be  for  its  evolution,  but  for  preparation 
of  heart  for  the  kingdom’s  appearing.  His  absorp¬ 
tion  in  that  celestially  originated  order  excluded 
from  his  mind  the  problems  of  the  developments  of 
industry,  government,  culture,  as  these  demands 
confront  us.  The  influence  of  Jesus  upon  the  prog¬ 
ress  of  social  institutions  seems  to  many  to  be  based 
upon  one  of  the  most  fortunate  misconceptions  that 
ever  blessed  mankind.  But  now  that  his  authentic 

*1  find  it  impossible  to  revert  to  what  seem  to  me  unhistorical 
interpretations  of  Jesus,  which  are  coming  into  vogue  in  some 
places.  To  try  to  make  Jesus  a  man  of  modern  affairs,  as  if  con¬ 
sidering  modern  conditions,  seems  to  me  to  help  to  an  understand¬ 
ing  of  him  no  better  than  when  he  is  rhetorically  characterized  as 
“the  sublime  mystic  of  the  Galilean  hills.”  Welcome  and  necessary 
are  criticisms  by  real  scholars  upon  the  exaggerations  and  omissions 
of  “the  eschatological  interpretation  of  Jesus.”  I  do  not  discuss 
the  question  of  the  advance  of  our  Lord’s  thought  and  plan  of  work 
during  his  ministry.  That  advance  seems  to  me  to  be  a  deepening  of 
his  supreme  and  inclusive  purpose,  the  Kingdom  of  God. 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


89 


thought  and  ideal  have  been  recovered,  we  can  no 
longer  profit  by  the  mistake. 

A  detailed  knowledge  of  Jesus’  expectation  would 
require  much  clearer  and  fuller  reports  of  his  teach¬ 
ing  than  we  possess.  In  such  paucity  of  data  we 
should  be  cautious  of  exaggerating  contradictions 
and  incongruities,  and  should  concentrate  upon  ele¬ 
ments  of  his  prophecy  that  are  pervasive.  There 
are  important  differences  from  Jewish,  Pauline, 
and  other  forms  of  the  hope  then  prominent  in  Is¬ 
rael,  of  an  impending  revolution  of  the  world  by 
divine  interference.  From  these  are  derived  many 
statements  incorrectly  attributed  to  Jesus  by  the 
evangelists.  But  there  remain  in  the  synoptic  rec¬ 
ords  utterances  derived  from  their  most  authentic 
sources,  and  which  are  consistent  with  our  best 
substantiated  knowledge  and  clearest  impression  of 
him.  In  these  reports  we  rec:g~ize  his  own  mes¬ 
sage.  Jesus  shared  the  general  hope.  He  purified 
it.  He  poured  into  it  his  own  spiritual  conscious¬ 
ness  and  social  passion. 

Jesus’  expectation  differs  from  the  materialism, 
secularism,  and  nationalism  dominant  in  the  Jewish 
and — with  modifications — the  Jewish-Christian  es¬ 
chatology.  It  also  differs  from  the  celestially  in¬ 
clined  hope  of  Paul,  from  which  the  colors  of  Jesus’ 
earth  of  the  glorious  future  have  faded,  and  from 
the  still  more  transcendentalized  expectation  of  the 
gospel  and  epistle  called  by  the  name  of  John.  Jesus 
looked  into  the  near  future  of  the  world  for  the 
realization  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  and  anticipated 


90  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

there  a  social  order  worthy  of  God  to  give  and  of 
men  to  receive.* 

The  change  which  Jesus  expected  is  only  subordi- 
nately  a  change  in  the  material  world.  It  is  a  re¬ 
generated,  revolutionized  order  of  human  life  upon 
the  earth.  Some  synoptic  passages  indeed,  judged 
to  be  essentially  his  because  they  are  characteristic 
of  him  and  closely  represent  their  oldest  sources, 
appear  inconsistent  with  this  anticipation.  Such 
incongruities  are  unavoidable  in  a  conception  which 
no  vision  or  thought  can  make  a  complete  unity. 
There  are  glorious  confusions  so  exultant  that  they 
can  never,  to  our  thought  at  least,  be  realized  on 
this  earth;  as  the  absence  of  death,  the  tangible 
presence  of  those  risen  from  the  dead,  including 
himself,  and  the  ordering  of  the  forms  of  human 
life  upon  celestial  models — “like  unto  the  angels.” 
That  these  confusions  did  not  confuse  him  is  due 
to  his  prophetic  consciousness,  essentially  different 
from  the  claim  of  a  magical  clairvoyance  of  future 
events.  It  is  not  a  rationalizing,  systematically 
constructive  consciousness.  He  was  not  concerned 
to  work  out  a  utopian  system.  The  new  order  is  the 
Father's  gift.  It  includes  every  good  which  the 
Father  can  bestow  upon  his  children.  How  its 
blessings  are  to  be  interrelated  is  the  Father’s  con- 


*Careful  readers  of  the  New  Testament,  though  not:  technically 
trained,  can  construct  the  expository  argument  on  its  main  lines  for 
themselves.  'They  should  keep  to  the  first  three  gospels,  read  “age” 
for  “world”  in  most  places  where  it  makes  sense,  and  understand 
“treasure — or  reward — in  heaven”  not  of  where  the  treasure  is  to  bo 
enjoyed,  but  of  where  it  is  being  kept.  Also,  “the  Kingdom  of  God" 
is  evidently  Jesus’  usual  phrase;  and  Luke  17:21  refers  to  the  King¬ 
dom’s  sudden  irruption:  the  translation  “among  you”  is  near 
enough.  These  hints  may  help  to  correct  other  misapprehensions. 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE  ft  „ 

cern,  not  his.  Of  inexhaustible  significance  is  his 
relation  of  the  kingdom  to  the  divine  fatherhood. 

In  his  thought,  nothing  men  can  do  hastens  or 
retards  this  impending  divine  event.  Its  coming 
and  the  moment  of  its  coming  depend  upon  God 
only.  Far  from  his  faith  was  the  Jewish  assump¬ 
tion  that  if  Israel  should  keep  the  law  for  one  day 
the  Kingdom  of  God  would  come.  Yet  men  are  to 
await  it,  not  with  folded  hands,  but  with  girded 
loins  and  lamps  trimmed  and  burning.  ‘‘Repent” 
was  his  proclamation,  “for  the  Kingdom  of  God  is 
at  hand.”  The  word  inadequately  translated  “re¬ 
pent”  means  an  inward  revolution.  It  is  not  merely 
a  repudiation  of  the  conduct  condemned  by  the 
morality  and  religion  of  his  time  or  of  any  imper¬ 
fect  time.  It  is  not  satisfied  with  standards  of 
righteousness  below  those  which  his  own  life  ex¬ 
pressed.  The  very  spirit  of  the  kingdom,  the  in¬ 
ward  holiness,  self-renouncing  devotion,  and  all- 
enduring,  all-forgiving  ministering  love,  to  which 
the  blessings  of  the  new  order  correspond,  must  be 
implanted  and  must  grow  in  the  receptive  heart. 
Not  that  this  establishes  the  kingdom  in  the  heart 
thus  directed  to  it.  Nor  has  it  become  established 
in  the  present  fellowship  of  men  thus  changed  in 
mind.  It  is  to  be  a  regnant  social  order,  not  yet 
realized.  Yet  this  new  life  in  the  soul  makes  its 
possessors  sons  of  the  kingdom,  no  longer  children 
of  the  present  age.  This  part  of  Jesus’  gospel  opens 
to  us  his  own  inexhaustible  treasures  of  character, 
spiritual  life,  and  devoted  ministry. 

These  are  the  two  essential,  inclusive  elements  of 


92  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Jesus'  message:  the  all-important  divine  event  in 
the  near  future,  and  preparation  of  heart  for  it. 
“Be  changed  inwardly :  for  the  Kingdom  of  God  is 
at  hand."  But  we  know  that  between  these  two  ex¬ 
tends  a  vast  field  of  human  tasks.  Only  by  the  ful¬ 
fillment  of  our  responsibility  to  the  tasks  of  civiliza¬ 
tion  may  mankind  advance  toward  the  perfected 
world-order  of  Jesus'  hope.  Admitting,  as  we  are 
forced  to  admit,  that  Jesus  was  mistaken  both  in 
the  nearness  and  the  manner  of  the  coming  of  God’s 
Kingdom  on  earth,  and  that  he  made  no  conscious 
provision  for  our  inalienable  responsibility,  must 
we  undertake  it  with  only  incidental  help  from  him, 
acknowledging  that  his  gospel  is  not  for  the  world 
as  it  is,  to  make  it  the  world  as  it  ought  to  be? 

§2 

The  significance  of  Jesus'  expectation,  it  is  said 
with  increasing  currency,  is  his  perception  that  the 
betterment  of  the  world  depends,  not  upon  a  process 
of  natural  evolution,  but  upon  spiritual  forces.  In 
this  sense,  it  is  said,  the  kingdom  descends  from 
heaven  and  is  God’s  gift,  whether  it  comes  soon  or 
late,  suddenly  or  progressively.  Without  entering 
upon  a  critical  analysis  of  this  thought,  we  may 
accept  its  estimate  of  spiritual  powers.  That  appre¬ 
ciation  will,  I  believe,  make  evident  that  the  essen¬ 
tials  of  Jesus’  hope  are  indispensable  for  the  task 
of  civilization  which  we  have  to  do,  and  inevitably 
translatable  into  it.  Also,  our  fulfillment  of  our 
task  will  be  found  to  be  historically  conditioned 
Upon  his  hope  as  he  held  it,  to  the  practical  suffi- 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE  93 

ciency  of  which  its  mistakes  and  limitations  are 
requisites. 

One  with  the  best  spirit  of  our  age,  one  with  a 
militant  and  devoted  humanism,  is  Jesus’  prophecy 
of  a  perfected  earth.  “The  distant  triumph  song” 
sounded  for  him,  not  from  the  heaven  above  us,  but 
from  the  earth  as  it  is  to  be,  from  happy,  pure,  and 
loving  men;  even  as  we  hear  it,  whose  hearts  hu¬ 
manity  has  touched,  while  we  toil  for  the  world’s 
perfecting.  His  deepest  and  tenderest  consolation 
to  his  disciples  about  to  be  bereft  of  him,  was  not 
that  they  should  “meet  the  Lord  in  the  air,”  nor 
that  he,  coming  again,  would  “receive  them  unto 
himself,”  in  that  heaven  to  which  he  was  returning, 
but  that  he  who  had  so  often  pledged  with  them  the 
cup  of  joy  and  love  would  “drink  it  new  with  them 
in  the  Kingdom  of  God.”  It  is  not  heaven  that  we 
are  working  for  or  can  work  for,  but  earth  as  he 
foresaw  it.  The  toiler’s  Kingdom  of  God  is  to  be 
here.  Often  our  hope  of  the  world’s  progress  is 
turned  to  doubt,  sometimes  to  despair.  Then  we 
limit  ourselves  to  patching  one  rent  or  another  of 
an  old  decaying  garment.  We  fret  to  make  some 
conditions  a  little  less  intolerable,  some  human  in¬ 
terrelations  a  little  less  discordant,  if  we  can,  be¬ 
tween  man  and  man,  nation  and  nation,  race  and 
race,  those  who  are  in  possession  and  those  who  are 
frantic  to  possess.  Then  we  sink  to  futile  compro¬ 
mises.  We  wander  along  desert  trails  that  lead 
nowhere.  Both  aim  and  inspiration  depart  from 
resultless  tasks.  We  need  the  reassurance  that 
abides  in  the  spirit  of  humanity,  and  which  rises  in 


94  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

our  hearts  from  the  insight  and  confidence  of  him 
who  was  most  human.  In  his  vision  we  see  that  the 
aims  most  spiritual,  the  faith  most  heroic,  move 
unfalteringly  on  to  the  hope  that  is  set,  not  unre- 
latedly  above  us,  but  attainably  before  us.  It  is 
this  hope  which  Intensifies  the  great  task  of  human¬ 
ity  upon  earth,  the  realization  of  humanity  in  the 
conditions  and  relations  of  earth. 

Jesus'  gospel  of  the  kingdom  offers  not  only  in¬ 
spiration  to  an  attainable  goal,  but  guidance  no  less. 
His  kingdom  is  for  the  poor;  this  is  our  directive 
principle.  His  dominant  beatitudes  are  to  the  hun¬ 
gry,  who  shall  be  filled ;  for  them  that  mourn,  who 
shall  be  comforted.  The  earth  is  the  inheritance 
of  the  meek,  even  the  lowly  and  oppressed.  These 
announcements  are  not  figurative.  Does  one  offer 
rescue  in  a  figurative  sense  to  drowning  men,  or 
figuratively  promise  bread  to  starving  children? 
Nor  is  he  pointing  to  heaven,  as  we  have  indolently 
and  supinely  misunderstood  him.  He  is  speaking  of 
the  establishment  of  his  Father's  Kingdom  upon  the 
earth.  Those  who  groan  under  the  intolerable  yoke 
of  tyranny,  inequality,  inhumanity,  and  are  hunger¬ 
ing  and  thirsting  for  God’s  righteousness  on  the 
earth,  shall  have  their  longing  satisfied.  The  last 
are  first  in  his  exultant  hope,  as  in  his  beneficent 
compassion :  the  last  must  be  first  in  every  human 
task.  The  initial  object  of  every  service  is  the  least 
of  these  his  brethren. 

In  this  incontrovertible  interpretation  of  his 
words,  ministry,  social  passion,  our  discipleship  to 
Jesus  gains  a  meaning  more  revolutionary  than  any 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


95 


socialistic  programs,  which  must  be  tested,  without 
prejudice  either  way,  by  their  practical  working 
out  of  his  aim.  His  gospel  of  the  kingdom  imposes 
a  task  pervasive  of  all  our  life,  of  every  man's  call¬ 
ing,  of  all  our  organizations  and  institutions.  Only 
as  practically  directed  to  the  redemption  of  the 
poor,  the  neglected,  the  miserable,  is  any  comfort, 
pleasure,  character,  spirituality  permissible,  any 
advantage  of  birth,  opportunity,  ability.  All  things 
which  are  not  directed  and  proved  effective  to  this 
end  are  to  his  disciples  unclean,  hateful.  They  are 
blasphemies  of  his  name,  repudiations  of  his  leader¬ 
ship,  rejections  of  his  salvation.  They  are  Peter's 
denials  of  him,  and  Judas's  betrayal.  Ministry  to 
the  last  and  least  is  the  primary  and  inclusive  pur¬ 
pose  of  all  government,  all  commerce,  all  industry, 
all  social  relations.  By  service  directed  to  them  im¬ 
partial  benefit  is  secured  for  all.  For  this  purpose 
the  gifts  of  genius  descend  from  the  wisdom  and 
compassion  of  the  all-loving  fatherhood,  wealth  is 
accumulated  and  distributed,  inventions  conquer  the 
material  to  human  uses  and  ends,  and  the  church 
preaches  the  gospel  to  the  poor. 

The  spiritual  nobility  of  Jesus'  hope  exempts  it 
from  particularistic  and  materialistic  aims.  Moral 
and  spiritual  regenerations  are  inseparable  from 
the  blessings  of  his  kingdom.  Into  it  may  enter 
only  the  righteous,  kind,  loving,  forgiving.  There¬ 
fore  our  ministry  to  the  last  and  least,  which  regu¬ 
lates  all  personal  and  social  action  is,  above  all  else, 
though  not  prior  to  all  else,  cultivation  of  their  mind 
and  heart  and  soul,  of  their  character,  spirituality, 


96  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

service.  Of  them  is  required  devotion  to  his  self- 
renouncing  ideals,  including  the  forgiveness  which 
brings  men  back  to  one  another  from  every  hatred, 
hostility  and  prejudice,  however  caused,  and  makes 
those  who  were  enemies  of  one  another  fellow- 
workers  for  the  Kingdom  of  God.  When  we  merge 
with  Jesus’  compassion  for  the  poor  his  demands 
upon  them — for  the  least  in  that  kingdom  is  to  be 
greater  than  the  greatest  of  this  age — when  we  rec¬ 
ognize  them  as  first  in  human  and  divine  regard, 
that  they  may  be  blended  with  all  citizens  of  the 
kingdom  in  equal  and  supreme  privilege  and  serv¬ 
ice,  it  can  be  said  with  clearer  meaning,  that  there 
is  no  other  practicable  all-inclusive  aim  for  human¬ 
ity  and  every  member  of  it.  Then  every  other 
principle  of  advance  yields  to  Jesus’  compassionate 
concentration  of  all  human  forces  upon  the  neg¬ 
lected,  the  oppressed,  the  last  and  least.  The 
opposite  principle,  most  monstrous  inhumanism  of 
the  passing  era  dominated  by  physical  science,  that 
the  inheritance  of  the  earth  is  the  contention  of  the 
strong  and  the  spoil  of  the  strongest,  has  gone  down 
in  the  world  war  to  everlasting  contempt.  Between 
the  two  principles  there  is  no  standing  ground,  and 
Jesus’  principle  can  make  no  compromise.  What¬ 
ever  aim  is  not  directed  to  that  or  comes  short  of 
that,  thereby  reverts  to  the  opposite.  It  is  time  to 
shame  its  antagonist  out  of  thought  as  out  of  his¬ 
tory.  Let  the  ape  and  tiger  die  out  of  our  philoso¬ 
phies.  For  men  are  of  a  higher  order,  which  has 
attained  another  principle,  save  as  the  brutes  have 
devotions  to  the  helpless,  in  anticipations  of  the 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


97 


human.  The  futility  of  the  anti-Christian  prin¬ 
ciple  is  attested  by  the  dark  places  of  the  earth,  the 
habitations  of  cruelty,  and  by  suffering  bodies  and 
barren  souls  about  us,  by  the  groaning  ages,  the 
horrible  reverses  of  humanity,  by  irreparable 
wastes  of  ability  stifled  under  poverty  and  oppres¬ 
sion,  by  potencies  of  ministry  suppressed,  by 
thought  and  beauty  and  leadership  wrenching  in 
vain  at  their  prison  bars,  or  dead  at  hungry  moth¬ 
ers’  empty  breasts. 

§3 

But  what  did  he  do  about  it?  He  did  the  only 
thing  he  could  do,  and  it  was  the  strongest  thing 
that  could  ever  be  done.  ^He  founded  the  new 
humanity,  which  is  the  fellowship  of  his  social  pas¬ 
sion.  This  was  not  the  church.  No  utterance  of  his 
which  meets  the  tests  of  authenticity,  as  demon¬ 
strated  in  the  general  trend  of  modern  scholarship, 
mentions  the  church.  It  receives  no  sanction  or 
inheritance  from  him,  except  in  so  far  as  it  belongs, 
with  other  practical  stimulations  and  agencies,  in 
the  fellowship  of  his  social  passion.  Many  tests  of 
membership  which  all  branches  and  divisions  of  the 
church  agree  in  imposing  are  nonessential  to  the 
fellowship  which  he  formed  and  is  ever  forming. 
Even  the  confession  of  his  name  is  not  a  requisite. 
Multitudes  of  those  whom  he  has  united  in  his 
spirit  do  not  know  the  source  of  their  regenerated 
social  and  personal  life.  This  result  is  to  his  un¬ 
speakably  greater  honor,  to  the  deeper  recognition 
of  his  power.  Multitudes  in  distant  climes  who 


98  ,  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

never  heard  of  him,  multitudes  who  lived  before  his 
coming,  are  members  of  the  brotherhood  which  he 
established  by  completing  it;  for  their  spirit  is  so 
akin  to  his,  and  his  regenerative  power  is  so  much 
greater  than  theirs,  that  their  true  devotions  to 
humanity  must  find  his  deeper  intensities,  must  be 
merged  into  his  larger  and  clearer  aims.  The  sym¬ 
pathetic  student  of  spiritual  history  must  judge 
that  the  greatest  names  are  destined  to  array  them¬ 
selves  under  the  name  that  is  above  every  name. 
This  judgment  becomes  conviction  in  men  who  at¬ 
tain  conscious  discipleship  to  him.  In  the  way  most 
direct,  simple,  inevitable,  he  established  the  new 
humanity,  into  which  everything  truly  human  pours 
itself.  He  attached  to  himself  a  little  company,  in 
most  of  whom  he  kindled  a  spark  from  his  own  fire. 
That  little  company  became  an  enlarging  nucleus — 
not  conterminous  with  the  church,  even  in  its  early 
history— -of  the  new  humanity,  or  rather  of  human¬ 
ity  restored  to  its  own  inmost  nature.  This  re¬ 
newed  mankind,  which  is  not  an  abstraction  or  a 
mass,  but  a  concrete  unity  of  souls  interrelated  in 
him,  endured,  expanding,  contracting,  corrupted, 
repurified,  baffled,  resurgent,  but  ever  on  its  way 
to  subdue  all  human  life  unto  itself. 

Against  the  discredited  interpretations  of  history 
which,  in  various  formulations,  reduce  its  power  of 
advance  to  material  forces,  capable  of  only  material 
results,  stands  history's  own  witness  that  its  power 
grows  through  companies  of  men  in  whom  a  vision 
has  dawned  and  a  passion  has  been  enkindled,  and 
that  material  things  and  developments  are  their 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


99 


instruments.  So,  when  we  are  tempted  to  despair 
of  any  predominant  good  resulting  from  the  colossal 
sins,  sacrifices,  heroisms,  of  the  world  war,  and  we 
sorrow  over  reactions  of  greed  and  insensibility, 
confusions  breeding  confusions,  recrudescenses  of 
brute  and  devil,  our  courage  grows  strong  again 
when  we  find,  in  high  places  and  lowly  places,  men 
to  whom  life  can  never  again  be  as  far  as  it  was 
from  Jesus’  hope  and  aim.  We  become  aware  of 
heart  responding  to  fraternal  heart,  and  determined 
will  joining  determined  will,  into  the  fellowship  of 
those  whom  the  woes  and  intrinsic  spiritualities  of 
humanity  have  absorbed.  We  know  that  the  world's 
future  is  given  into  their  hands.  This  fellowship 
springs  from  the  heroic  devotion  of  those  who  gave 
their  lives  that  humanity  might  live.  So  the  all- 
inclusive  fellowship  created  by  Jesus,  in  which  this 
fellowship  from  the  world  war  was  formed  and  is 
completed,  is  vitalized  forever  from  his  heroic  sacri¬ 
fice.  His  glorious  death  of  love,  agony,  and  shame 
rises  increasingly,  in  immortal  life,  into  the  broth¬ 
erhood  of  the  world  as  it  is  to  be.  This  is  what  he 
did  about  it.  He  did  the  only  thing  he  could  do,  and 
it  was  the  strongest  thing  that  could  ever  be  done. 

Jesus’  expectation  of  the  almost  immediate  gift 
of  God’s  Kingdom  can  connote  a  lack  of  wisdom 
only  to  those  who  suppose  that  thought  has  any 
value  when  it  is  less  than  a  transforming  power. 
The  dissevered  intellectualism  which  then  remains 
is  on  a  level  with  the  performances  of  arithmetical 
prodigies.  The  wise  man  is  not  one  who  separates 
himself  from  those  limitations  of  his  time  which 


100  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

enshrine  its  noblest  hopes  and  aims.  The  prophets 
of  Israel  were  greater,  not  less,  for  conditioning  the 
world’s  hope  upon  the  fortunes  of  Israel.  If  it  were 
true  that  certain  medieval  thinkers  anticipated  the 
German  idealists,  and  died  leaving  no  trace  upon 
the  mind  of  their  age,  those  barren  cliffs  of  desolate 
seas  cannot  compare,  in  the  world’s  gratitude,  with 
men  who  spoke  to  their  own  time  some  comprehen¬ 
sible  word  that  stirred  it  on.  It  is  wisdom  to  take 
into  one’s  own  soul  the  highest,  strongest  impulse 
which  at  the  time  broods  on  the  hearts  of  men.  This 
Jesus  did  when  he  fused  the  contemporary  expecta¬ 
tion  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  into  all  his  thoughts  and 
deeds.  It  is  wisdom  to  ennoble  and  humanize  the 
supreme  impulse  of  one’s  own  time,  to  enforce  the 
moral  and  spiritual  conditions  of  realizing  its  hope, 
and  to  create  its  devoted  brotherhood.  This  Jesus 
did.  If  he  had  attempted  or  even  imagined  more, 
he  would  have  accomplished  little,  for  only  through 
appropriation  of  the  best  in  one’s  own  generation 
can  one  work  upon  the  ages  following.  And  when 
the  form  bursts  asunder,  the  spirit,  which  pours 
itself  into  the  molds  of  each  generation,  remains  to 
inspire  and  guide  through  all  successive  forms. 

What  personal  expectation  mingled  with  his  uni¬ 
versal  hope?  Did  he  anticipate  a  seat  on  the  right 
hand  of  power,  coming  on  the  clouds  of  heaven,  and 
all  his  holy  angels  with  him?  Such  claims  wake 
little  response  in  hearts  attuned  to  his  self-renounc¬ 
ing  ministry.  We  welcome  every  success  of  criti¬ 
cism  in  sifting  out  from  the  Gospels  the  additions 
to  his  authentic  sayings  concerning  the  Kingdom  of 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


101 


God,  because  so  little  is  left  of  the  pretensions  at¬ 
tributed  to  him.  His  theme  was  the  kingdom,  not 
the  Christ.  All  the  more  evidently  is  he  central  in 
his  eternal  religion,  because  the  supreme  signifi¬ 
cance  is  forced  upon  him  by  the  experience  of  his 
disciples.  So  the  fourth  Gospel  would  be  a  tawdry 
thing  if  understood  to  be  an  authentic  report  of  his 
own  words  and  deeds.  It  is  a  glorious  thing,  not¬ 
withstanding  its  ecclesiasticisms  and  long  anti¬ 
quated  attempts  at  philosophy,  when  it  is  recog¬ 
nized  as  the  imaging  of  the  significance  which  Jesus 
has  attained  in  the  mind  and  heart  of  humanity. 
Criticism  has  not  been  able  indeed  to  deny  his  mes¬ 
sianic  consciousness,  but  has  made  evident  that  this 
consciousness  was  predominantly  of  the  inspired 
and  empowered  herald  of  the  kingdom.  Every  for¬ 
ward  look  into  his  own  destiny  was  the  confidence 
of  the  victory  of  his  mission,  expressed  in  whatever 
incidental  and  traditional  forms.  The  modern  pop¬ 
ular  understanding  of  the  title  “Son  of  Man,” 
though  it  has  no  suspicion  of  the  original  meaning, 
does  not  misinterpret  essentially  his  mission  and  his 
consciousness.  He  who  announced  the  kingdom, 
building  better  than  he  knew,  as  does  every  man  in 
proportion  as  the  spirit  of  humanity  and  the  God 
of  it  sweeps  through  him,  founded  the  kingdom 
from  the  spiritual  attainments  of  humanity  and  his 
own  soul,  by  forming  the  brotherhood  of  service  to 
the  last  and  least.  He  desires  no  pompous  throne 
from  which  to  lord  it  over  us  and  to  exercise  author¬ 
ity  upon  us.  He  came  into  the  world's  history  never 
to  be  ministered  unto,  forever  to  minister,  to  the 


102  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

utmost  power  of  redemptive  sacrifice.  The  attain¬ 
ments  of  his  life,  the  triumph  of  his  cause,  are  his 
only  lordship.  They  are  his  supreme  lordship  be¬ 
cause  he  gave  himself  to  them  utterly. 

The  heralding  of  the  kingdom,  his  essential  mes- 
siahship,  determined  all  his  ministry.  For  the  suf¬ 
ficient  herald  has  more  to  do  than  to  announce  his 
message  in  words.  The  very  spirit  of  the  kingdom 
must  possess  him,  must  be  expressed  in  him,  and 
this  is  one  with  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God.  He  could 
not  have  announced  the  kingdom  if  his  life  and 
deeds  had  not  enabled  him  to  say,  “The  spirit  of  the 
Lord  is  upon  me.”  That  spirit  of  the  kingdom 
makes  its  representative  holy  in  its  holiness,  loving 
in  its  love,  unto  the  last  demand  of  heroic  devotion, 
and  stern  as  the  conditions  of  entering  the  king¬ 
dom  are  inviolable.  It  urges  him  to  those  minis¬ 
tries  which  shall  constitute  the  kingdom’s  consum¬ 
mations:  it  impels  him  to  open  the  blind  eyes,  to  set 
at  liberty  them  that  are  bruised,  to  preach  the  gos¬ 
pel  to  the  poor,  to  receive  sinners  and  to  eat  with 
them,  to  pour  himself  out  to  the  last  and  least.  His 
unparalleled  but  not  miraculously  incredible  influ¬ 
ence  upon  sick  bodies  and  distracted  minds,  through 
the  faith  wdiich  his  announcement  awakened,  was 
derived  from  the  same  consciousness,  that  as  am¬ 
bassador  he  was  the  representative  of  the  king¬ 
dom’s  beneficent  power.  Through  all  the  wild  exag¬ 
gerations  of  the  gospel  reports  there  is  manifest  in 
him  a  calm  restraint  in  his  exercise  of  this  influ¬ 
ence.  He  subordinated  it  to  his  office  of  herald  of 
the  kingdom,  and  made  it  contributory  to  his  high 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


103 


calling.  Therefore  it  never  led  him  into  failure, 
through  attempts  to  exceed  that  power’s  legitimate 
exercise.  He  correctly  viewed  his  mighty  works  as 
attestations  of  his  message,  credentials  of  his  of¬ 
fice.  And  as  the  kingdom  is  God’s  gift,  so  these 
works  of  his  are  by  God’s  power.  In  every  way 
Jesus’  announcement  of  the  kingdom  rises  into  the 
power  of  his  life  to  organize  it. 

Complaints  against  Jesus,  that  he  failed  to  attack 
the  evil  or  senescent  institutions  of  his  day,  need 
not  long  detain  the  historic  sense.  These  criticisms 
take  too  little  account  of  his  terrific  indignations, 
his  blastings  of  those  abuses  which  encountered  his 
high  mission.  In  the  reports  of  his  denunciations, 
the  bitterness,  unfairness,  and  scurrility  attributed 
to  him  by  the  evangelists  manifest  so  plainly  the 
temper  aroused  in  his  successors  by  their  conflicts 
with  Judaism,  and  are  so  unlike  his  habitual  poise 
in  the  face  of  his  antagonists,  that  no  unbiased  his¬ 
toric  criticism  can  charge  them  against  him.  He 
entered  the  conflicts  necessary  to  his  heart-search¬ 
ing  and  persuasive  announcement  of  the  Kingdom 
of  God.  Whatever  opposed  that  proclamation  he 
fought  down,  though  the  battle  swept  on  to  Cal¬ 
vary.  His  two  chief  antagonists  were  hypocrisy 
and  inhumanity.  Hypocrisy  was  to  him  the  sub¬ 
stitution  of  another  spirit  for  the  spirit  of  the  king¬ 
dom.  Inhumanity  culminated  in  the  laying  of  a 
stumbling-block  in  the  way  of  God’s  little  ones. 
This  was  the  battle  which  his  heralding  encoun¬ 
tered.  Upon  it  has  depended  our  age-long  strife. 


104  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION  ! 

Faithful  to  his  orders,  he  refused  to  divide  his 
forces  for  any  other. 

§4 

The  work  left  for  us,  in  connecting  the  two  great 
elements  of  Jesus’  gospel,  involves  modifications  of 
some  of  his  teachings  in  the  interest  of  his  purpose, 
to  which  alone  they  are  subordinate,  and  by  which 
alone  they  are  amendable.  Literal  faithfulness  to 
them  is  spiritual  unfaithfulness  to  his  aim.  Non- 
resistance  to  the  evil  man,  or  that  waiving  of  an 
individual  right  which  compromises  the  progress 
of  universal  human  rights,  means  something  differ¬ 
ent  from  Jesus’  view,  to  those  who  must  work  out 
the  order  which  he  expected  to  descend  soon  from 
God.  The  accumulation,  distribution  and  use  of 
wealth  may  be  different  from  the  unsocial  covetous¬ 
ness  and  self-indulgence  against  which  he  prophe¬ 
sied,  when  we  take  wealth  as  an  instrument  for 
serving  his  ends.  The  developing  institutions  and 
goods  of  civilization  are  different  when  they  become 
the  progressive  incarnations  of  the  good  most  dear 
to  him.  In  these  tasks  we  develop  instruments  out¬ 
side  his  absorptions,  and  unnecessary  for  the  work 
he  had  to  do. 

The  work  which  is  left  to  us  makes  the  demands 
of  our  discipleship  severe  and  difficult.  A  man  who 
loses  in  the  things  of  it  Jesus’  spirit  and  purpose  is 
none  of  his.  Then  our  toils  and  strifes,  however  we 
may  attempt  to  justify  them,  become  subversive  of 
Ms  desire.  When  the  pursuit  or  retention  of  these 
things  contradicts  his  purpose,  we  must  unbind  our¬ 
selves  from  them  and  fling  them  away.  None  the 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


105 


less,  ineffectiveness  in  any  man’s  part  of  the  world’s 
work  is  more  severely  judged  by  the  standards  of 
the  Kingdom  than  by  the  world’s  inconsiderate  de¬ 
mands.  God’s  workmen  have  no  time  off.  Sleep  and 
food,  recuperations  and  replenishments  of  ex¬ 
hausted  powers,  play,  respites  when  “ I  loaf  and  in¬ 
vite  my  soul,”  books  and  art,  joy  and  love,  prayer, 
meditation,  and  the  cultivation  of  the  spiritual  life, 
— all  are  for  the  world’s  work  that  we  have  to  do, 
and  implicit  in  it;  and  the  sternest  demand  of  the 
work,  which  is  the  life,  is  that  it  shall  somehow  and 
every  way  direct  itself  and  concentrate  itself  upon 
Jesus’  great  purpose  of  ministry  to  the  last  and 
least.  When  this  is  done,  the  care  and  fret  and 
exhausting  self-regarding  ambition,  with  slavish 
dependence  upon  the  world’s  estimates  of  success, 
fall  away,  leaving  it  all  a  delight  in  the  spirit  and 
purpose  which  now  occupy  even  its  least  details. 

Whatever  powers  we  employ  for  his  Kingdom’s 
service,  the  supreme  energies  are  from  his  heart. 
The  age  to  come  is  the  conquest  of  his  sacrifice  and 
ours,  as  at  every  morning’s  renewal  of  our  tasks  we 
take  up  our  cross  and  follow  him.  Force  beats  back 
evil  that  a  space  may  be  won  where  his  plants  of 
life  may  grow,  from  his  light,  his  tears,  his  bloody 
sweat.  We  use  resisting,  annihilating  force  to  the 
end  that  it  may  become  unnecessary.  The  carnal 
weapons  of  our  warfare  achieve  victories  by  the 
superior  strength  of  heroic  devotion,  not  because 
we  take  the  lives  of  his  enemies,  but  because  we  give 
our  own.  From  the  compulsions  which  we  enlist 
for  his  cause,  we  keep  out,  so  imperfectly,  the 


106  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

opposites  of  liis  spirit,  which  cancel  his  designs. 
And  we  find,  in  sublime  contrasts  to  our  inefficien¬ 
cies,  how  great  were  his  ways  of  getting  things 
done.  So  wealth,  though  it  may  be  his  instrument, 
may  suddenly  change,  even  in  the  hands  of  best 
intention,  from  a  rod  of  power  to  a  serpent  that 
darts  at  the  face  of  him  who  holds  it.  Still  the 
covetousness  of  its  accumulation  and  the  self-in¬ 
dulgence  of  its  use  are  as  evident  as  when  Jesus 
branded  the  mammon  of  unrighteousness.  Dives, 
faring  sumptuously  every  day,  is  eulogized  because 
some  crumbs  from  his  table  are  fed  to  Lazarus  laid 
at  his  gate  full  of  sores.  Even  wealth’s  purest 
philanthropies  are  infected  by  the  injustices  of  its 
accumulation  and  tenure  of  proprietorship  in  an 
un-Christianized,  unhumanized  industrial  order. 
Many  who  have  the  talent,  which  they  must  use, 
for  getting  it,  and  are  oppressed  by  the  load  of  it, 
struggle  in  vain  against  the  present  barbarous  con¬ 
ditions,  to  find  a  practicable  way  to  the  righteous 
acquiring  and  distributing  of  it.  Those  who  are 
most  blatant  to  show  the  way  out  are  blind  leaders 
whom  only  the  blind  can  conscientiously  follow. 
The  intensifying  class  struggle  for  wealth  makes 
little  progress  because  it  neglects  to  consider  the 
purpose  of  wealth.  The  church,  though  not  com¬ 
petent  to  work  out  a  science  of  wealth,  is  under 
obligation  to  proclaim  a  gospel  of  its  motives  and 
ends,  by  which  its  methods  may  be  tested;  but  she 
shirks  her  responsibility.  To  this  inefficiency  is 
due  a  large  part  of  her  futilities.  And  meanwhile 
the  wealthiest  benefactions  descend  from  riches  of 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


107 


the  soul.  So  institutions  which  house  the  finer 
accumulations  of  civilization  are  transient  taber¬ 
nacles  of  the  humanity  regenerated  from  Jesus' 
heart.  Many  which  seemed  essential  have  become 
superfluous.  Artificial  complexities  will  work  out 
into  natural  simplicities  at  last.  Our  tasks  are  like 
those  which  we  give  to  a  child,  when  we  care  little 
for  what  is  outwardly  accomplished,  if  only  the 
child  is  developed  by  them.  Yet  all  the  more  earn¬ 
estly  do  we  apply  these  insufficient  devices  because 
we  perceive  their  insufficiency;  for  our  task  is  not 
only  to  use  them,  but  continually  to  improve  the 
means  which  we  must  use,  unto  perfectings  beyond 
our  sight,  changing  the  earth  as  it  is  into  the  earth 
that  is  to  be.  All  the  realm  bequeathed  to  us  between 
Jesus'  goal  and  his  creation  of  the  new  humanity, 
we  fill  from  his  life  which  continually  renews  and 
unites  us,  and  from  his  purpose  which  guides  us. 
We  are  servants  bidden  to  wait  and  watch  for  our 
lord ;  but  his  way  to  us  is  impassable ;  therefore  we 
go  to  meet  him,  and  across  the  flood  that  bars  his 
progress,  we,  with  labor  and  long  pain,  build  the 
road  by  which  the  King  of  Glory  shall  come  in. 

§  5 

Now  that  Jesus’  hope  is  found  to  be  fixed  upon 
a  perfected  earth,  the  charges  against  him  of  other¬ 
worldliness  and  historic  pessimism  fall  to  the 
ground.  They  were  always  evidently  contrary  to 
his  view  of  nature  and  his  estimate  of  men.  But 
from  the  opposite  direction  objections  arise,  only 
to  be  merged  into  his  hope. 


108  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Perfection,  it  is  urged,  is  unattainable  and  unde¬ 
sirable.  It  would  turn  to  evil  if  attained.  A  per¬ 
fected  earth,  with  all  its  problems  solved,  all  its 
ambitions  accomplished,  with  nothing  to  do  except 
the  same  old  things,  nothing  left  to  strive  for,  to 
amend,  would  be  lubber-land,  a  garden  of  Eden, 
a  blank,  an  extinction.  But  it  is  a  deeper  thought 
that  perfection  is  not  static,  but  dynamic,  an  energy 
of  holy  love  that  fulfills  itself  and  accomplishes 
evolving  tasks  always  and  from  more  to  more.  No 
lower,  idler  perfection  than  this  is  in  Jesus’  soul, 
nor  is  anything  unworthy  of  this  in  his  hope.  Hope 
does  not  contradict  the  energies  that  form  it. 

But,  it  is  again  objected — and  these  two  objec- 
jections  seem  to  involve  whatever  may  be  chal¬ 
lenged  from  this  side — this  earth,  which  Jesus 
made  his  goal  in  what  he  supposed  the  fulfillment 
of  God’s  purpose,  is  as  a  spark  in  the  flaming  uni¬ 
verse,  gleaming  for  a  moment,  and  then  ashes. 
What  are  the  traversible  miles  of  its  circumfer¬ 
ence,  in  spaces  which  light  years  cannot  measure! 
What  are  the  computable  millenniums  of  its  pos¬ 
sible  habitableness,  in  eons  to  which  the  birth,  dura¬ 
tion  and  death  of  the  star-mist  beyond  Andromeda 
are  an  incident!  The  expectation  of  Jesus  may 
seem  to  disappear  with  the  shriveling  up  of  his 
cosmology.  Is  the  human  spirit,  in  this  instance 
at  its  most  generous  ideal,  again  overwhelmed  by 
superspatial  and  supertemporal  immensity?  Yet  in 
some  estimates  all  bigness  sinks  into  insignificance 
in  comparison  with  the  universe  of  Jesus’  soul  Nor 
would  our  astronomy  have  changed  his  hope  and 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


109 


purpose  any  more  than,  upon  reflection,  it  need 
change  that  of  us  today,  who  know  the  science  of 
which  he  was  ignorant,  and  are  learning  the  rudi¬ 
ments  of  the  wisdom  which  he  knew.  For  the  work 
which  anyone  must  do  is  the  work  next  his  hand. 
If  it  is  an  eternal  task,  it  begins  and  continues  with 
the  task  at  hand.  The  universe  beyond  this  world 
is  not  now  our  field  of  labor;  it  becomes  so  by  our 
work  upon  this  earth.  Every  faithful  man  works 
in  the  lot  assigned  him,  or  rather,  attainable  by 
him,  to  make  that  place  better,  in  Jesus’  spirit, 
toward  Jesus’  goal.  Every  faithful  man  works 
with  every  other,  in  the  works  which  unite  and  ad¬ 
vance  to  redeem  the  earth,  in  Jesus’  spirit  and  to 
Jesus’  goal.  And  when  we  feel  ourselves  transcend¬ 
ent  of  these  limitations,  for  God  hath  set  not  the 
world  only  but  eternity  in  our  heart,  we  may  see 
our  earth  task  flashing  its  signals  beyond  the  orbit 
of  Mars.  They  are  responsive  signals.  God’s  work 
of  redemption  is  everywhere  in  his  encircling  skies, 
and  is  accomplished  by  those  who,  in  every  lot  at¬ 
tainable,  work  together  for  his  Kingdom  in  the 
works  appointed  them.  The  perfecting  of  earth  is 
essential  and  directive  in  Jesus’  work  and  ours. 
It  is  not  final.  The  service  to  the  last  and  least 
everywhere  is  final.  The  work  and  the  workers 
beyond  us  are  one  with  us  in  his  prayer,  “Thy 
Kingdom  come.” 

§  6 

When  we  ask  what  detailed  contributions  Jesus 
has  made  to  the  consciousness  and  the  tasks  of  our 
awakening  spiritual  humanism,  the  wealth  of  the 


110  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

answer  amazes  us.  He  discovered,  to  mention  only 
a  part  of  his  discoveries,  the  child,  the  woman,  the 
common  man,  the  union  of  spiritual  aima  with  daily 
toils,  the  fundamental  answer  to  the  perplexities  of 
human  relations.  From  the  God  of  the  social  passion 
down  to  the  place  of  the  sparrow  and  the  grass  of 
the  held  in  the  universal  order,  which  is  the 
Father's  love,  everything  that  enters  man’s  life,  or 
touches  it,  is  implicit  in  Jesus’  gospel.  Every  prob¬ 
lem  of  politics,  of  industry,  of  the  courses  of  In¬ 
dividual  lives,  of  the  unity  of  lives  in  the  great 
human  brotherhood,  depends  for  the  essentials  of 
its  solution,  and  therefore  for  the  use  and  direction 
of  every  element  in  the  process  of  its  solution,  upon 
his  progressive  creation  of  a  new  humanity  con¬ 
centrated  in  the  primal  devotion  to  the  last  and 
least.  The  demonstration  of  this  thesis  is  far  be¬ 
yond  the  scope  of  these  few  reflections.  It  can  be 
completely  established  only  when  the  Kingdom  of 
God  is  come.  Yet  it  is  safe  to  derive  our  guiding 
principle,  whose  proof  can  be  only  in  its  outwork¬ 
ing,  from  the  fusion  of  Jesus’  hopes  with  the  works 
we  have  to  do ;  especially  as  that  principle  has  never 
yet  failed  to  result  in  deep  satisfactions,  to  the 
man  who  tests  his  life’s  efficiencies  by  their  work¬ 
ings  out  of  character  and  spirituality,  of  joy  and 
love,  and  of  the  conditions  favorable  to  these  things. 
This  effectiveness  is  the  supreme  instance  of  the 
universal  content,  the  inexhaustibly  unfolding  ap¬ 
plication  of  simplest  principles.  Nor  is  this  appre¬ 
ciation  lessened  by  the  recognition  of  the  wide 
realms  which  Jesus  could  not  enter.  The  greatness 


THE  GALILEAN  SOURCE 


111 


of  any  thinker  is  measured  by  the  applicability  of 
his  thought  to  activities  which  are,  by  historic 
necessity,  outside  his  view.  The  wisdom  which 
meets  that  test  has  attained  the  heart  of  things. 
It  is  a  continually  evolving  and  orginating  power 
of  thought  and  action  in  its  disciples,  and  becomes 
more  originative  with  each  successive  generation 
of  them. 

In  our  day,  as  in  other  epochs  of  change,  mankind 
has  seemed  to  have  come  to  the  parting  of  the  ways, 
the  parting  of  Jesus’  way  from  ours.  Once  more 
many  earnest  men,  with  tender  reverence,  with 
stern  devotion  to  the  work  at  hand,  bid  him  fare¬ 
well.  They  and  the  generations  after  them,  they 
know,  can  never  forget  the  gentlest,  holiest,  manli¬ 
est  presence  that  ever  blessed  the  earth.  Sanctify¬ 
ing  memories  of  him  will,  they  gratefully  acknowl¬ 
edge,  impart  inspiration  to  tasks  which,  they  judge, 
are  not  his  tasks,  and  which  must  be  pursued  along 
ways  that  are  not  his  way.  With  aching  hearts  of 
loneliness  we  follow  the  path  which  now  opens  to 
our  advance.  And  before  us  again  we  see  the 
guiding  presence  of  our  Master.  In  his  leadership 
we  are  united  into  the  new  humanity  continuously 
created  by  him,  as  he  leads  us,  one  in  heart  and 
purpose,  to  the  neglected,  the  oppressed,  the  last 
and  least  of  his  brethren.  To  the  starving,  ruined 
peoples  he  leads  us,  and  to  the  waste  places  of  the 
earth,  many  of  them  at  our  doors;  wherever  there 
is  ignorance,  wherever  there  is  crime,  and  the  publi¬ 
cans  and  the  harlots  rise  up  and  follow  him ;  wher¬ 
ever  there  is  poverty  that  withholds  the  largest 


112  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

human  privilege;  wherever  a  little  child  of  a  back¬ 
ward  race  is  denied  equal  and  supreme  opportunity 
of  all  the  accumulated  excellencies  of  mankind.  It 
is  into  a  regenerated  civilization  that  we  follow 
him.  It  were  better  for  a  civilization  that  a  mill¬ 
stone  were  hanged  about  its  neck  and  that  it  were 
drowned  in  the  depth  of  the  sea,  than  that  it  should 
lay  a  stumbling  block  before  one  of  these  little  ones. 
Through  this  earth  and  beyond  it,  we,  his  brother¬ 
hood,  sweeping  into  our  front  ranks  those  who 
were  the  neglected  and  oppressed,  follow  him,  to 
the  spirits  in  prison,  to  the  innumerable  dead  of 
unillumined  ages,  wherever  in  his  unending  path 
there  are  blind  eyes  to  be  opened,  dead  souls  to  rise 
again,  hate  to  be  won  to  love,  lower  forms  of  ex¬ 
istence  to  be  led  up  into  his  universal  human,  forms 
of  spiritual  life  unimaginable  to  us,  to  be  united 
in  the  fellowship  of  his  inexhaustible  helpfulness; 
there  is  his  leading,  there  is  our  following,  into 
fulfillments  everywhere  of  the  love  for  which  he 
died. 


VI 


MODERN  APPROACHES 

Wearily  we  strain  and  twist 
Through  the  tangled  wild: 

Singing  up  the  path  we  missed 
Comes  a  little  child. 

0  synopsis  of  the  history  of  modern  humanism 


is  attempted.  The  aim  is,  to  distinguish  in 


^  1  that  development  the  elements  which  succes¬ 
sively  became  distinct.  These  elements  are  still  at 
work,  not  having  been  lost  in  the  processes  which 
they  began.  Their  present  aspects  help  to  inter¬ 
pret  their  original  energies.  We  may  hope  to  unite 
these  developed  elements  in  an  inclusive  humanism. 


§  1 


As  the  student  of  medievalism  traces  the  course 
of  its  dominating  forces,  he  is  often  interrupted  by 
a  lilt  of  popular  song,  a  racy  old  tale,  a  stirring 
passage  of  a  chronicler  absorbed  in  fight  and  festi¬ 
val.  How  large  a  part  of  medieval  life  eluded  the 
forces  that  tried  to  repress  it!  The  church,  for  ex¬ 
ample,  asserted  a  superhuman  order  against  the 
natural  life  of  man,  and  labored  to  penetrate  life 
with  that  superhuman  order.  Her  success  was 
greater  in  the  first  ambition  than  in  the  second. 
She  dominated  more  than  she  penetrated. 

That  she  penetrated  to  a  considerable  depth  there 


113 


114  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

can  be  no  question.  The  word  medieval  connotes 
a  peculiar  religious  quality  residing  in  most  men 
of  the  middle  ages  in  Western  Europe.  But  a  hin¬ 
drance  to  its  pervasiveness  was  just  its  dominance. 
[The  assertion  that  human  life  is  in  itself  without 
independent  value,  implicit  purpose,  and  inner  law, 
aroused  that  life's  self-consciousness.  Its  native 
instinct,  however  shaped  by  the  domination  of  the 
church,  repelled  at  a  certain  point  the  penetration 
of  the  church.  This  human  impulse  was  contorted 
into  strange  forms,  grotesque,  outrageous,  elusive, 
obscene,  hideous,  pathetic,  beautiful,  by  the  incon¬ 
gruous  forces  of  heathenized  Christianity  and 
christened  heathenism.  That  which  concerns  our 
subject  is  a  repressed  humanism,  struggling  to¬ 
ward  that  degree  of  self-consciousness  which  may 
assert,  against  religious  and  political  enthrallments, 
its  own  original  and  independent  value,  aim,  and 
law. 

It  is  not  the  culture  of  the  middle  age  as  culture 
to  which  attention  is  called,  though  the  rebellious 
popular  impulse  had  many  contacts  and  some  in¬ 
terpenetrations  with  that  culture.  It  is  also  evi¬ 
dent  that  medieval  culture,  though  employed  by 
the  church,  and  adorning  the  courts  of  princes, 
often  cherished  the  same  rebellion  in  its  heart.  It 
is  not  cathedral  builders  whom  I  have  in  mind,  nor 
those  who  kept  the  Hellenic  torch  still  burning, 
or  passed  on  the  lyre  to  Petrarch's  hands,  so  much 
as  the  impulse  of  the  people,  how  uncouth  in  com¬ 
parison,  yet  no  less  essential  to  the  later  awaken¬ 
ings  of  humanism. 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


115 


If  we  limit  humanism  to  cultural  developments, 
we  lose  the  human  and  have  only  an  ism  left,  for¬ 
mal,  bloodless,  ineffective.  When  we  consider  hu¬ 
manism’s  Galilean  source,  we  find  there  the  recog¬ 
nition  of  simple,  natural  impulse,  which  Jesus 
would  not  destroy,  but  fulfill.  The  purpose  of 
Hellenism  is  the  democracy  of  culture.  Humanism 
is  not  something  to  be  superimposed  upon  the  fun¬ 
damentals  of  human  life,  but  is  the  interpretation 
of  the  common,  and  its  empowering  against  every 
religious  and  secular  domination.  Humanism,  which 
is  the  flood  of  historic  life  to  fill  our  lives,  is  his¬ 
torically  derived  not  only  from  Hellenic  culture  and 
the  social  spirituality  of  Jesus,  but  also  from  medi¬ 
evalism’s  self-assertions.  Humanism’s  progress  is 
not  only  along  Parnassian  heights  and  through  the 
mountain  city,  Christ’s  Jerusalem,  but  it  must  also 
be  traced  by  the  print  of  the  white  feet  of  Nico- 
lette  upon  the  dew-drenched  grass,  through  the  am¬ 
orous  night,  and  by  the  stench  of  witch-rides.  The 
path  leads  through  riotous  merry-makings,  inter¬ 
minable  feuds,  across  plough-lands  fertilized  by  the 
peasant’s  grimy  sweat  and  diseased  blood,  through 
famines  and  pestilences,  through  hard-won  exten¬ 
sions  of  civil  and  industrial  rights,  and  hard-lost 
restrictions  of  them,  through  smouldering  or  flam¬ 
ing  indignations  against  religious  and  secular  im¬ 
positions.  The  human  claim  to  its  own  original 
and  independent  value,  aim,  and  law,  though  re¬ 
peatedly  mutilated,  crushed,  left  for  dead,  ever  rose 
again  mightier  than  the  two  swords.  For  the  weak¬ 
ness  of  men  was  stronger  than  the  alleged  divine 


116  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


order,  before  which  it  was  bidden  to  renounce  it¬ 
self;  its  ignorance  more  wise;  its  miseries  more 
august;  its  sins  less  unholy. 

Today  the  humanism  of  our  social  passion  must 
not  only  devote  itself  to  farm  and  shop,  thorough¬ 
fare  and  alley,  but  must  also  accept  their  contri¬ 
butions.  With  all  their  vulgarities,  there  resides  in 
them  the  human  impulse,  capable  of  all  high  things. 
As  we  continue  our  glimpses  of  humanism's 
historic  progress,  we  shall  find  ourselves  for  awhile 
among  elect  men  and  distinctive  opportunities.  But 
the  strength  of  the  rude  medieval  impulse  was 
a  part  of  their  inheritance.  The  wanings  of  that 
fair  humanism  were  caused  in  large  measure  by  its 
dissociation  from  the  life  of  the  people.  The  later 
revivals  of  humanism  include  harvests  from, 
medievalism's  prolific  soil. 

§2 

The  plant  of  humanism  became  fertilized  with 
pollen  from  a  far  off  tree  of  life.  Petrarch  means 
to  us  the  fourteenth  century’s  awakening  to  that 
■which  he  called  humanism.  Though  he  was  un¬ 
familiar  with  the  Greek  language,  he  clearly  dis¬ 
tinguished  the  Greek  spirit  in  its  Roman  continua¬ 
tions.  From  Hellenic  Latin  writers  he  learned  a 
human  life  beautiful  and  noble  in  its  own  right, 
apart  from  church  arid  Christianity,  a  life  of  un¬ 
derived  worth,  with  its  own  purpose  and  inner 
law. 

Loved  by  all  the  world  as  prince  of  lovers,  his 

exquisitely  refined  sentiment,  dedicated  to  the  In- 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


117 


carnation  and  idealization  of  human  loveliness,  ex¬ 
pressed  the  humanism  of  this  pioneer  of  modern 
men.  It  was  a  humanism  calm,  disciplined,  un- 
militant,  with  most  attractive  dignity  and  charm. 
His  noble  scorn  of  ecclesiastical  corruptions  was 
not  fierce  enough  to  drive  him  into  attempts  at 
radical  reform,  by  challenge  of  church  authority. 
The  opposite  of  recluse  or  pedant,  he  lived  a  genial, 
active  life  in  the  superior  interests  of  his  time, 
which  he  advanced  by  appreciations  of  the  Hellen¬ 
ism  that  was  accessible  to  him.  It  was  not  in  his 
genius  to  perceive  that  a  life  essentially  independent 
in  worth  and  law  and  purpose  cannot  stop  short 
of  subduing  all  things  to  itself,  and  that  it  must 
generate  new  guides  for  humanity,  and  pervade 
mankind.  The  humanism  which  he  named  by  right 
of  rediscovery  was  content  to  limit  its  reconstruc¬ 
tive  powers.  The  historic  optimist  may  judge  that 
this  was  best  for  humanism's  course.  Humanism 
might  have  been  submerged  under  the  Impending 
storm  if  it  had  put  far  out  to  sea.  It  was  finely 
self-indulgent,  and  concessive  to  the  powers  that 
were.  Patrons  needed  it  for  the  enrichment  of  their 
pride,  and  were  considerate  of  their  minister.  The 
early  humanists  consented  that  the  mass  of  men 
should  live  more  brutally  than  humanly.  Those 
who  could  attain  were  welcome  into  the  select  de¬ 
mocracy  of  culture.  Yet  humanism  is  nothing  less 
than  life  asserting  its  right  to  be  unrestrained  from 
without.  It  cannot  be  confined  permanently  within 
exclusive  amenities,  any  more  than  lightning  can 
be  kept  within  the  cloud. 


118  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

It  is  a  long  voyage  from  the  fourteenth  century 
to  our  rising  tide  of  humanism,  democratic,  social, 
spiritual.  A  reversion  to  Petrach’s  spirit  is  human¬ 
ity's  betrayal.  There  is  a  difference  greater  than 
the  distance  in  time,  between  the  quality  of  men  to 
whom  humanism’s  deeper  implications  had  not 
been  disclosed,  and  those  who  now  reject  the  sum¬ 
mons  to  the  larger  human  life.  These  cannot  know 
the  whole-hearted  delight  of  the  rediscoverers  of 
humanism,  who  plunged  into  the  worths  and  exulta¬ 
tions  of  the  life  which  they  felt  in  its  underived 
value,  purpose,  and  inner  law.  We  of  today  can¬ 
not  be  restricted  to  their  task.  To  imitate  them  now 
is  to  make  oneself  the  center  of  intellectual  and 
aesthetic  gratifications,  so  forfeiting  the  right  to 
humanism  by  denying  its  universally  social  essen¬ 
tials,  now  revealed.  An  aesthetic  as  well  as  ethical  in¬ 
sensibility  is  evident.  Generally  this  withdrawal 
from  humanity  entails  perverse  judgments  and 
tastes  concerning  the  intellectual  and  artistic  goods, 
for  which  the  social  self  is  bartered.  But  even  when 
this  peril  is  avoided,  so  that  a  few  such  men  are 
ranked  among  the  authorities  of  knowledge  and 
the  arbiters  of  beauty,  and  even  when  the  creative 
gift  is  added,  so  that  they  gratify  themselves  most 
by  expression,  still  they  are  at  best  contributors  to 
life,  not  guides  of  life.  Alas  for  young  souls  that 
accept  them  as  guides! 

There  is  a  different  quality  when  elect  thinkers, 
poets,  artists,  passionate  for  truth  and  beauty,  blend 
deep  wisdom  and  rare  loveliness  with  social  appre¬ 
ciations,  sympathies,  and  participations,  and  pour 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


119 


their  gathered  wealth,  thus  completed,  into  the 
universal  life.  Of  the  same  spirit  are  those  who 
plant  in  humble  door-yards,  and  along  common 
ways,  flowers  whose  fragrance  blesses  all  the 
neighborhood.  The  Petrarchan  humanism,  if  re¬ 
ceived  as  an  element  of  life,  may  penetrate  all  life 
with  grace  and  understanding.  To  its  inner  shrine 
the  servant  of  humanity  may  often  retire  in  the 
rest  times  which  test  character,  because  then  a  man 
goes  where  he  will,  not  where  he  must.  From  the 
finer  thoughts  and  Hellenic  forms  he  brings  wisdom 
and  beauty  for  men’s  houses  and  shops  and  fields 
and  market-places.  To  infuse  these  goods  into  life 
is  an  abiding  task  of  humanism,  a  relief  from  the 
austerities  of  the  strife  by  which  the  social  passion 
achieves  its  spiritual  ends.  And  if  at  length  old  age 
makes  our  hands  too  feeble  and  our  knees  too  re¬ 
laxed  for  the  rushing  charge — though  what  we 
desire  is  that  the  trumpets  clanging  all  around  us 
may  be  the  last  sound  we  hear — if  retirement  to 
calm  realms  of  truth  and  beauty  be  forced  upon  us 
who,  through  all  the  strife,  have  loved  the  repose 
of  truth  and  beauty,  how  sweet,  for  a  little  interval, 
will  be  those  fair,  untroubled  meadows  of  our  exile. 

In  the  amazing  fourteenth  century,  there  grew 
pregnant  harvests  of  that  other  humanistic  impulse 
which  we  recognized  under  medieval  repressions. 
In  Chaucer — to  confine  ourselves  to  a  few  English 
instances — the  popular  humanism  is  lustily  repre¬ 
sented,  along  with  finer  things.  Langland  and  Wat 
Tyler  are  nobler  names.  Later,  among  the  protagon¬ 
ists  of  the  English  renaissance,  the  great  Eliza- 


120  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


bethans  owe  no  less  to  that  rankness  than  to 
Petrarch’s  fineness. 

We  must  ever  be  mindful  of  this  indigenous  hu¬ 
manism,  if  we  would  share  the  progress  of  human¬ 
ity.  It  struggles  up  from  the  heart  of  the  people, 
which  desires,  with  whatever  wildness,  uncouth¬ 
ness,  fleshliness,  to  learn  the  intrinsic  values  of 
human  life.  It  is  to  be  recognized  whenever  there 
are  unschooled  attempts  to  express  the  human  seif, 
not  only  in  gentleness,  strength,  and  devotion,  but 
also  beneath  some  moral  perversities — not  only  in 
truth,  but  also  under  many  forms  of  error.  Self- 
expression  is  the  note  of  it.  It  is  wherever  one 
draws  or  paints  it,  sings  it,  dances  it,  or  breaks 
heads  for  it.  Such  recent  and  contemporaneous 
self-expressions  in  lands  long  priest-ridden,  king- 
ridden,  alien-ridden,  are  among  the  most  bewilder¬ 
ing  auguries  of  the  world’s  tempestuous  tomorrow. 

The  two  humanisms  seek  one  another  to  destroy 
one  another,  until  they  learn  that  they  are  to  be 
fulfilled  in  unity.  In  considering  the  phase  which 
we  call,  too  narrowly  but  conveniently,  the  renais¬ 
sance,  it  is  customary  to  emphasize  the  former 
power.  In  the  phase  which  centers  in  the  French 
Revolution,  the  second  is  evident.  In  humanism’s 
present  stage  there  are  intimate  interblendings. 

§  3 

The  Italian  renaissance,  the  rebirth  of  the  Occi¬ 
dent,  was  obviously  the  result  of  an  historic  process, 
with  initiations  through  many  degrees.  But  the 
men  of  the  Italian  renaissance  were  not  concerned 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


121 


with  the  fore  hung  reflections  of  Apollo’s  gleaming 
wheels.  If  we  dwell  too  much  on  the  preliminaries, 
we  miss  participation  in  their  wonder  and  delight 
when  “the  dawn  came  up  like  thunder’  out  of  the 
Ionian  Sea. 

The  renaissance  created  intense  individualities. 
It  is  this  quality  which  I  select,  not  arbitrarily,  I 
trust,  for  our  glance  at  this  great  time.  The 
recognition  of  this  characteristic  is  important  for 
the  understanding  of  the  humanism  which  is 
broader  and  deeper  than  they  conceived,  but  into 
which  this  quality  enters.  The  renaissance  tended 
to  illustrious  exemplars,  born  of  its  spirit  of  virile 
personality.  Such  men  were  concentrations  of  their 
time.  They  were  not  limited  to  the  circle  of  finely 
intellectual  and  artistic  genius,  in  which  were  the 
creators  of  many  forces  in  modern  thought  and  life. 
From  this  personal  reinvigoration  were  developed 
also  the  consolidaters  of  monarchy,  in  which  the 
European  nations  were  formed  for  men’s  develop¬ 
ment  and  repression.  The  renaissance,  by  no  means 
limited  to  culture,  included  many  whose  interest 
in  great  thoughts  and  beautiful  forms  was  super¬ 
ficial,  incidental,  or  nil.  All  those  were  of  the 
renaissance  who  felt  the  individual  life  as  having 
its  own  right  and  value,  its  own  purpose  and  inner 
law.  The  conviction  was  more  than  medieval,  for 
it  was  less  defiant  than  self-assertive.  It  was  more 
than  Petrarchan,  for  it  was  unconcessive. 

Varied  were  the  forms  assumed  by  this  emanci¬ 
pated  individualism.  Cultural  proclivities  did  not 
always  repress  incongruous  qualities  in  the  same 


122  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

individual.  There  were  men  of  great  devotions,  for 
often  devotion  to  another  person  is  born  of  intense 
personal  self-consciousness.  These  are  the  great 
lovers.  That  love,  thus  derived,  might  extend  to 
all,  include  all  in  one’s  self.  Browning’s  penetrative 
historic  imagination  has  given  us  instances.  From 
the  same  individualistic  energy  there  arose  men 
of  great  hates,  of  monstrous  bestialities,  of  im¬ 
pregnable  self-centered  indifference,  and  men  who 
flung  themselves  into  incredible  cruelties,  greeds, 
treacheries.  Thence  also  were  derived  the  eccentric¬ 
ities  of  the  renaissance,  including  its  vulgar  eccen¬ 
tricities.  Among  men  of  elegant  manners  mingled 
eminent  humanists  who  fed  from  the  sumptuous 
tables  of  the  Medici  as  from  a  trough,  and  whose 
proximity  antidoted  the  incense-breathing  gardens. 
There  were  individualists  of  resplendent  culture 
who  loved  its  reflections  in  less  gifted  men,  and  in 
an  enriched  civic  life;  and  there  were  men  of  a 
culture  no  less  accomplished  who  enclosed  it  within 
their  own  bosoms,  or  shot  it  forth  in  devouring 
flames.  There  were  servile  copies  of  dominant  per¬ 
sonalities.  This  imitation  worked  against  personal 
distinctiveness,  and  yet  belongs  to  the  individualism 
of  the  time.  Before  the  eminent,  inferior  men 
cringed  and  fawned,  to  gain  in  any  way  the  ma¬ 
terials  for  personal  ends;  and  with  this  motive 
great  men  cringed  to  one  another.  Yet  along  with 
all  that  is  despicable,  there  is  a  certain  infernal 
dignity  in  the  worst  of  the  renaissance.  Then,  if 
ever,  men  were  “magnificent  in  sin.”  This  individ¬ 
ualism,  noth  with  standing  terrible  and  grotesque 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


123 


perversions,  is  especially  needed  now,  to  be  blended 
into  democratic,  social,  and  spiritual  developments 
of  humanism. 

The  individualism  of  the  renaissance  stimulated 
religion  to  stress  the  value  of  each  human  soul.  But 
here  opens  a  path  which  this  type  of  humanism 
could  not  follow.  For  while  the  social  conscious¬ 
ness,  when  spiritually  awakened,  seeks  the  thought 
and  experience  of  the  divine  in  developments  of 
social  life,  the  individualistic  consciousness,  when 
spiritually  awakened,  finds  no  hope,  no  security,  no 
basis  for  the  soul’s  being,  except  in  the  super¬ 
human  God.  Then  the  divine  will  leaves  nothing 
to  the  human  will  except  complete  submission.  And 
before  the  absolute  will,  to  which  there  is  uncon¬ 
ditional  surrender,  the  human  will  finds  no  place 
for  itself.  It  is  overwhelmed,  annihilated.  The 
Calvinistic  temper  becomes  inevitable.  In  that  loss 
the  humanity  is  lost  which  has  asserted  for  itself 
an  independent  value,  intrinsic  purpose,  and  inner 
law. 

The  Calvinistic  spirit  may  have  magnificent  out- 
workings.  Men  whom  the  pilgrims  of  Plymouth 
typify,  strong  in  the  will  of  God,  contemn  every 
insolence  which  opposes  the  divine.  They  fear  no 
man,  since  they  fear  the  Almighty,  They  feel 
themselves  impelled,  by  that  irresistible  power,  into 
organizations  in  which  there  can  be  no  human  pre¬ 
rogative.  Here  Calvinism  transcends  itself  by 
making  the  will  of  God  one’s  own  achieving  soul. 
There  are  baser  issuings  of  the  Calvinistic  spirit. 
The  soul,  overawed,  may  accept  whatever  bondage 


124  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

is  imposed  in  the  name  of  the  supreme  sanction,  as 
enslavement  to  a  book,  a  creed,  a  Catholic  reaction, 
an  ecclesiastical  order,  whether  Romish  priesthood 
or  Puritan  ministry.  Humanism  is  driven  either 
to  renounce  itself,  or  to  reassert  itself  against  re¬ 
ligion,  to  the  incalculable  detriment  of  both.  Or 
some  compromise  is  attempted  which  is  neither 
humanistic  nor  religious. 

Against  the  overstressed  individualism  of  the 
renaissance  the  solidaric  force  of  reaction  mar¬ 
shaled  its  myrmidons.  It  opportunely  reformed 
Catholicism,  and  so  consolidated  it  that  frequent 
cannibalistic  roastings  of  human  flesh  were  per¬ 
mitted  to  the  inquisition,  with  ignominious  repris¬ 
als  in  Protestant  lands.  Monarchy  exploited  the 
solidaric  religious  tradition.  Both  ecclesiastical 
and  political  tyrannies,  under  the  lead  of  individ¬ 
ualists  with  solidaric  aims — a  frequent  combination 
in  all  times — turned  to  account  strong  personali¬ 
ties,  like  Loyola  and  Machiavelli.  The  enemies  of 
humanism,  and  of  religion  as  affected  by  human¬ 
ism,  had  this  advantage,  that  individualism  drives 
its  participants  against  one  another,  to  the  destruc¬ 
tion  of  themselves  and  their  principle.  Because  of 
the  excesses  and  deficiencies  of  humanistic  individ¬ 
ualism,  the  representatives  of  the  superhuman  and 
its  sacred  institutions  could  fulminate  against 
humanism  in  the  name  of  morality,  social  order, 
and  all  high  things.  Tyranny  sang  a  raucous  sec¬ 
ond  to  this  tune,  for  there  was  given  to  it  divine 
right,  with  other  nauseous  religious  pretences.  The 
continuance  of  the  renaissance,  and  its  transmis- 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


125 


sion  from  land  to  land,  were  due  far  more  to  its 
own  inherent  powers  than  to  the  dubious  monarch- 
ieal  patronage,  under  which  its  virility  declined. 
It  is  significant  that  representative  philosophies, 
with  exceptions  prophetic  of  the  great  German 
idealism,  for  a.  long  period  left  undeveloped  the 
principles  of  personality  and  inner  freedom.  Church 
and  state  repressed  the  personal,  and  opposed,  as 
the  chief  antagonist  of  reaction,  the  social  develop¬ 
ment  of  the  consciousness  of  personality. 

Thus  the  humanistic  individualism  of  the  renais¬ 
sance  disclosed  many  defects,  was  insufficient  for 
religious  needs,  and  was  weak  before  its  enemies. 
None  the  less  is  the  emphasis  upon  the  individual 
an  essential  element  of  those  inspirations  of  the 
renaissance  which  rend  every  tomb,  attaining 
glorious  resurrections.  The  social  passion  of  our 
time  has  imperative  need  of  this  individualism,  and 
must  know  it  especially  in  its  potency  of  social 
fulfillment. 

The  irreconcilable  opposites  are  not  the  social 
and  the  individual,  but  the  social  and  the  solidaric. 
The  instances  of  the  latter  which  have  been  cited 
may  serve  in  place  of  a  definition.  Every  individ¬ 
ual,  as  the  following  chapters  may  describe,  owes 
himself  to  the  social,  and  is  therein  fulfilled. 

The  individualistic  and  the  solidaric  have  strange 
alliances.  The  former  is  frequently  won  to  the 
purposes  of  the  latter.  Ecclesiasticisms,  Roman 
and  other,  have  often  made  fervent  personalities 
their  tools.  Nietzsche's  doctrine  of  an  individual¬ 
ism  blind  to  its  social  completions  was  useful  to 


126  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

colossal  institutionalism  controlled  by  ruthless  des¬ 
potism.  The  solidaric  and  the  social  are  opposites. 

The  favorite  device  of  solidaric  strategists  is  to 
urge  a  social  motive  for  an  unsocial  end.  They 
blasphemously  appeal  to  generous  impulses.  They 
prank  themselves  with  holy  names.  When  they 
fail  to  deceive  or  to  seduce,  they  try  to  coerce,  and, 
failing  in  that,  to  crucify.  To  young  manhood  and 
young  womanhood,  whom  we  must  win  to  the  social 
passion,  it  must  be  said,  for  their  sakes  and  in  be¬ 
half  of  the  cause  which  is  inherently  theirs:  that 
whatever  asks  of  them  less  than  the  fulfillment  of 
every  personal  power  must  be  rejected,  however 
gruesome  its  threats,  as  of  hell,  or  moral  ruin,  or  a 
disordered  world;  however  insinuating  its  cajoler¬ 
ies,  as  of  heaven,  or  perfection  by  such  sacrifice,  or 
a  redeemed  humanity.  The  religion  of  Jesus  helps 
here;  for  it  is  equally  true  that  his  gospel  is  social 
gospel,  and  that  it  asserts  the  supreme  worth  of 
every  soul.  These  two  faiths  are  one. 

The  renaissance  manifests  the  social  importance 
of  great  personalities.  Strong  individuals  are  also 
indispensable  in  the  narrow  fields,  to  which  lack 
of  opportunity  restricts,  or  love  constrains.  The 
disparagement  of  this  importance  by  the  school 
which  traces  history  by  tendencies  alleged  to  be 
independent  of  great  souls,  desocializes  the  social 
forces  which  it  stresses,  by  depersonalizing  them. 
The  great  personalities  do  indeed  form  themselves 
from  influences  and  tendencies,  from  combinations 
of  events  and  of  human  contacts  that  are  beyond 
any  man's  planning.  But  strong  personality  con- 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


127 


centrates  these  forces,  simplifies  and  intensifies 
them,  makes  them  vital  and  personal  in  itself,  so 
that  they  may  not  go  to  waste,  like  the  unharnessed 
tides.  Every  emphasis  therefore  of  a  great  per¬ 
sonality's  dependence  upon  his  time  demonstrates 
his  indispensableness  to  his  time  and  the  times  suc¬ 
ceeding.  Whenever  there  is  a  groping  after  a 
“great  cause  to  array  us"  the  prayer  must  rise: 
“King  and  leader,  appear!  Thy  soldiers  sorrowing 
seek  thee."  When  he  does  not  appear  the  cause 
halts.  The  most  generous  impulses,  the  most  en¬ 
thusiastic  aspirations,  how  often  in  history,  how 
pitifully  now,  are  they  like  sheep  without  a  shep¬ 
herd.  There  is  required  in  the  king  and  leader  a 
marked  individuality  in  a  developed  social  con¬ 
sciousness,  a  dominant  personality  fused  into  a 
great  cause.  Without  this  combination  no  assump¬ 
tion  of  leadership  is  accepted,  unless  to  be  soon  re¬ 
pudiated. 

The  cultivation  of  superior  personalities  is  neces¬ 
sary  for  every  kind  of  social  advance.  We  recog¬ 
nize  them  when  we  glance  along  our  library  shelves, 
or  when  we  recall  from  school  days  the  teachers 
who  led  us  by  sympathetic  wisdom,  and  the  boys 
and  girls  endowed  with  leadership,  they  and  their 
fellows  knew  not  how;  the  city  upon  which,  in  its 
formative  stage,  high-minded  men  of  affairs 
stamped  indelibly  their  honorable  standards;  rever¬ 
ent  friendships,  which  influence  us  increasingly 
with  the  lapse  of  bereaved  years ;  the  home  thrilled 
with  the  presence  of  a  grand,  sweet  woman;  com¬ 
munities  which  we  have  known,  especially  those  of 


128  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

simple  people,  which  advanced  as  some  plain,  faith¬ 
ful  man  or  woman  showed  the  way.  To  leadership 
by  the  development  of  one’s  own  personality  one 
must  aspire  who  lives  and  loves,  and  he  dedicates 
his  enlarged  powers  to  remove  everything  that  ob¬ 
structs  the  growth  of  other  men,  and  to  reinforce 
every  favorable  influence,  yet  never  halting  in  the 
advance  of  his  own  soul.  Must  not  every  man  say 
that  love  has  led  him  on  ?  Love  to  some  rich  souls 
whose  faces  we  have  seen,  to  some  whom  we  have 
never  seen,  to  one  whom  we  hope  to  be  like  when 
we  see  him  as  he  is.  Those  whom  the  world  loves 
lead  the  world  on.  Because  love  is  strongest,  the 
great  personalities  who  inspire  love  are  essential  to 
humanity’s  advance. 

The  advocacy  of  every  organization  of  men 
which  claims  to  be  efficient  and  humane  must  meet 
this  test:  does  it  tend  to  the  development  of  indi¬ 
viduality  ?  Does  it  open  a  free  course  for  each  man 
to  work  out  whatever  he  is?  While  it  is  obvious 
that  men  can  live  together  only  by  the  frequent 
surrender  of  individual  preferences,  by  mutual 
adaptiveness,  by  the  shaping  of  each  career  for  the 
advancement  of  all,  yet  none  of  these  adjustments 
should  be  the  sacrifice  of  individual  quality,  but 
rather  its  social  self-realization.  Attempts  at  re¬ 
ligious  unity  which  concede  away  any  spiritual 
freedom  are  self-condemned.  A  united  church  uni¬ 
versal  would  be  too  dearly  bought  by  the  silencing 
of  “one  accent  of  the  Holy  Ghost.”  First  of  all, 
from  every  repressive  and  divisive  sectarianism 
let  the  untrammeied  spirit  set  men  free! 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


129 


The  same  regard  for  the  individual  must  be  ap¬ 
plied  to  all  standardizations,  educational,  industrial, 
or  whatever,  and  to  all  that  government  undertakes 
for  the  advancement  of  the  people.  International 
alliances  must  respect  national  characteristics.  It 
is  not  enough  to  get  things  done.  We  must  get  men 
accomplished,  in  that  variety  of  talent  and  oppor¬ 
tunity  which  gets  things  done  that  are  worth  doing, 
in  that  free  unity  of  effort  and  spirit  which  this 
variety  secures. 

The  danger  of  movements  for  social  betterment 
is  that  they  may  revert  to  their  solidaric  opposite. 
The  advocates  of  a  new  industrial  order  are  con¬ 
fronted  with  this  stultification  of  their  purpose. 
If  they  cannot  overcome  it,  it  does  not  follow  that 
we  must  limit  ourselves  to  developing  the  forms 
of  our  present  organization;  but  we  must  together 
find  a  way  on  for  individual  power  and  variety. 
If  the  prerequisite  of  a  new  order  is  that  each  man 
must  commit  his  career  to  the  decision  of  others, 
however  democratically  they  may  be  chosen,  and 
however  faithful  and  able  servants  of  society  they 
might  be,  the  worst  evils  of  the  present  order  would 
be  intensified.  From  the  present  repressions  of  in¬ 
dividuality  we  must  set  ourselves  free,  from  the 
fearful  waste  of  individual  possibilities,  from  the 
innumerable  abortions  of  intellectual,  administra¬ 
tive,  and  spiritual  potencies,  while  great  voices  “die 
with  all  their  music  in  them,”  and  unsuspected 
capacities  of  leadership  leave  men  “as  sheep  with¬ 
out  a  shepherd.”  Yet  even  in  the  present  order 
^re  forces  which  foster  individuality,  and 


130  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


these  must  be  retained,  either  in  the  evolution  of 
what  we  have,  or  in  revolution.  No  alleged  rights 
of  property  may  block  the  way.  Property  can  be 
nothing  more  than  the  instrument  of  the  human 
soul.  It  possesses  no  right  except  that  service.  Our 
immediate  effort  must  be  for  the  equal  and  supreme 
opportunity  of  every  human  being,  of  every  nation 
and  race  and  clime,  to  fulfill  itself  and  its  service. 

The  individualism  of  the  renaissance  is  an  imma¬ 
ture  expression  of  humanism.  But  if  that  individ¬ 
ualistic  intensity  is  relaxed,  so  much  the  weaker 
becomes  the  force  of  individualism’s  social  fulfill- 
ments. 

§4 

Later  phases  are  the  humanism  of  democracy 
and  the  humanism  of  the  social  passion,  which  is 
most  conscious  of  spiritual  aims.  Of  the  former  it 
is  almost  impertinent  to  write,  after  the  book  which 
crowned  the  career  of  James  Bryce,  supreme 
student  of  democracy.  The  little  that  is  written 
here  concerns  the  transitional  nature  of  the  demo¬ 
cratic  spirit,  as  it  passes  from  individualistic  to 
social  humanism.  The  epoch  of  physical  science, 
which  followed  the  outburst  of  democracy,  appears 
to  the  humanist  not  to  be  the  magnificent  advance 
which  it  boasted,  but  an  intrusion,  so  far  as  this 
servant  of  humanity  presumes  to  direct  its  master’s 
course. 

Democracy,  when  its  social  implications  are  un¬ 
developed,  attempts  to  make  the  rights  of  any  man 
the  rights  of  every  man.  Its  basis  and  definition 
of  rights  are  vague,  because  it  has  not  attained  the 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


131 


social  conception  of  rights.  Its  purpose  springs 
from  the  heart  of  the  people,  long  repressed.  It 
is  also  an  extension  to  all  men  of  the  individualism 
of  the  renaissance.  No  historic  movement  was 
more  evidently  popular  than  that  which  the  French 
revolution  typifies.  No  historic  movement  owes 
more  to  men  of  culture  for  its  preparation  and  in¬ 
spiration. 

The  earlier  awakenings  of  humanism  appeared 
to  their  participants  to  be  aristocratic.  Their  note 
seemed  to  be  distinction,  not  universality.  Their 
goods  were  offered  to  individuals  or  localities  ex¬ 
ceptionally  favored  in  ability  or  position.  The  sun¬ 
rise  from  the  Ionian  Sea  irradiated  the  heights, 
while  darkness  enshrouded  the  valleys.  Yet  in  the 
renaissance,  and  in  the  fourteenth  century  also, 
democratic  elements  were  indispensable.  Human¬ 
ism,  the  assertion  of  the  human  spirit,  is  as  broad 
as  humanity,  however  it  may  try  to  limit  itself. 
This  was  especially  evident  in  the  highest  places, 
as  in  Lorenzo’s  court.  Poets  and  artists,  even  when 
under  princely  patronage,  are  forced  by  the  nature 
of  their  task  and  the  impulse  of  genius,  to  express 
the  universal  human.  Distinction  belongs  only  to 
the  universal.  So  even  in  the  most  exclusive  in¬ 
stances,  humanism’s  individualism  tends  to  a  gen¬ 
eral  individualism  as  its  next  achievement. 

The  democratic  principle  aroused  men,  united  as 
in  a  great  army,  fervent  to  impart  to  all  men  the 
rights  of  any  man.  But  the  principle  easily  became 
disruptive,  a  war  of  rights  against  rights,  and  ever 
in  danger  of  reverting  to  solidaric  institutionalism. 


132  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

It  was  a  plain  man  of  the  people,  seeing  far  be¬ 
yond  the  vision  of  his  time,  who  exclaimed,  at  the 
beginning  of  the  French  revolution,  “My  God,  my 
country,  my  fellow-citizens  have  become  myself.” 
The  right  of  every  man  was  to  him  the  equal  and 
supreme  privilege  of  participation  in  the  universal 
life.  The  rights  of  the  individual  had  unfolded  for 
him  into  the  social  consciousness.  The  rights  of 
each  involve  the  rights  of  all,  not  as  a  sum  of  indi¬ 
viduals,  but  as  a  concretely  interblended  life  of 
humanity.  This  man  had  risen  above  the  balanc¬ 
ings  and  bargainings  of  mine  and  thine,  the  com¬ 
mercializing  of  human  relations,  which  make  for 
the  advantage  of  the  unscrupulous  and  the  despot¬ 
ism  of  the  strong. 

Democratic  humanism  cannot  claim  to  derive  any 
right  from  a  superhuman  power.  There  is  no 
ground  of  right  in  external  conditions.  An  indi¬ 
vidual  can  have  rights  with  reference  to  other 
individuals  only  in  that  which  connects  him  with 
them,  and  that  is  social.  There  appears  to  a 
humanist  no  ground  of  rights  in  any  abstract  con¬ 
ceptions,  imposing  to  the  multitude.  The  philoso¬ 
phy  which  commends  itself  to  the  mob  when  it 
begins  to  think  it  thinks,  is  that  which  exchanges 
concrete  reality  for  pretentious  words.  Popular 
shibboleths  may  be  as  empty  as  metaphysical  cate¬ 
gories.  The  words  liberty,  equality,  fraternity, 
Americanism,  even  humanity,  may  mean  whatever 
fools  and  knaves  put  into  them.  Democracy,  which 
connotes  social  relations,  attains  validity  in  the 


MPDERN  APPROACHES  133 

social  consciousness,  and  enduring  vitality  in  the 
social  passion. 

This  social  impulse  is  in  the  heart  of  the  com¬ 
mon  people,  which  is  the  principal  source  of  dem¬ 
ocracy.  The  select  person  is  satisfied  to  walk  alone. 
Plain  men  much  prefer  to  walk  in  company.  They 
benevolently  force  their  society  upon  your  observ¬ 
ant,  meditative  strollings,  in  some  lovely  haunt 
which  invites  solitude — because  they  suppose  you 
are  as  lonely  as  they  would  be.  The  trained  voice 
delights  to  sing  its  solo.  A  popular  audience  de¬ 
sires  to  accompany  the  vocalist.  In  spite  of  all 
vulgar  selfishness,  the  life  of  simple  men,  so  far  as 
they  live  indeed,  consists  mainly  of  mutual  loves 
and  common  cares.  Gregariousness  clamors  for  in¬ 
dividual  rights,  but  in  a  chorus  which  expresses 
the  social  passion  in  the  heart  of  man. 

The  cultural  movement  toward  democracy  had 
social  implications  which  look  beyond  democracy. 
Though  the  dawn  had  faded,  the  humanism  of  the 
renaissance  gained  partial  revivals,  some  of  which 
were  advances  toward  a  social  consciousness.  How 
varied  they  became  may  be  indicated  by  citing 
some  names  from  among  the  heralds  of  the  democ¬ 
racy  destined  to  be  more  than  democracy:  Wesley 
and  Voltaire,  Cowper  and  Rousseau,  Kant  and  Jef¬ 
ferson. 

The  name  of  Wesley  suggests  a  religious  move¬ 
ment  more  humanistic  than  the  Protestant  reform¬ 
ation,  nothwithstanding  the  omission  of  many 
human  values.  For  he  recognized  not  only  the 
worth  of  the  human  soul,  but  also  its  active  partici- 


134  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

pation  in  its  own  redemption.  Wesley’s  God  and 
Christ  are  not  so  much  above  us  as  within  us.  His 
religion  is  of  the  inner  spiritual  life  for  all  men. 
He  far  surpasses  the  earlier  reformers  in  sympathy 
for  the  joys  and  sorrows,  the  struggles  and  attain¬ 
ments  of  the  spirit  working  under  the  conditions 
of  common  life.  There  is  for  him  no  exclusion  of 
non-elect  souls.  The  universal  grace  connotes  the 
participation  of  all  in  the  indivisible  humanity. 

The  Wesleys  were  necessarily  contemporaneous 
with  the  assertion  in  literature  of  that  democratic 
element  which  is  essentially  social.  Its  expressions 
of  common  life  are  of  individual  experiences.  Yet 
they  are  common  in  the  highest  sense :  they  are  uni¬ 
versal.  They  blend  all  hearts  into  one  music.  So 
the  rills  of  folk-song  flowed  into  the  great  deep  of 
the  symphony.  The  German  idealism,  when  we  in¬ 
terpret  its  fundamental  thoughts  by  the  spirit 
which  awakened  them,  directed  each  man  to  turn 
for  truth  to  his  own  soul,  that  he  might  find  there 
the  portal  of  the  universe.  Into  the  founding  of 
the  American  republic  and  the  advance  of  English 
liberalism  entered  social  forces  of  long  growth, 
however  imperfect  and  dimly  conscious  of  their 
own  nature. 

Up  from  the  people  swarmed  the  devils  which 
had  been  driven  into  the  oppressed  people.  The 
grossness,  fleshliness,  and  lightly  slumbering  fury 
of  that  continuing  medievalism  are  grotesque  in  the 
shapes  of  slaves:  they  are  monstrous,  devastating, 
when  they  come  to  rule.  Yet  even  in  the  bewildered 
beginnings  of  the  democratic  phase  of  humanism. 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


135 


we  must  admire  its  fervent  sympathies,  its  flaming 
indignations.  These  impulses  unfold  the  conscious¬ 
ness  of  the  universal  human.  They  tend  to  free  all 
forms  of  human  relations,  not  the  political  alone, 
from  being  distortions  of  the  soul. 

The  inadequacy  of  its  social  consciousness  was 
manifest,  among  other  examples,  in  the  lack  of  that 
historic  sense  which  recognizes  the  course  of  events 
as  the  onflowing  of  the  one  great  interblended  life, 
in  which  every  attempt  at  further  progress  must 
be  vitally  related  to  those  which  have  been 
already  won.  Defects  were  evident,  in  absorptions 
in  political  affairs,  in  stress  of  rights  above 
obligations,  in  waverings  between  emphasis 
upon  the  individual  and  reliance  upon  magi¬ 
cal  powers  of  institutions  and  abstract  conceptions. 
The  history  of  democracy  consists  of  two  opposite 
efforts,  one  a  reversal,  the  other  an  unfolding.  In 
the  first  it  attempts  to  establish  itself  in  forms 
which  become  solidaric.  In  the  second  it  labors  to 
unfold  its  implicit  social  consciousness,  with  forms 
socially  free  from  that  perversion.  That  it  must 
do  one  or  the  other  shows  that  its  nature  is  transi¬ 
tional.  We  must  recognize  democracy  as  a  magnifi¬ 
cent  advance,  and  prove  ourselves  faithful  by  blend¬ 
ing  it  with  humanistic  achievements  which  pre¬ 
ceded  it,  and  by  fulfilling  it  and  them  in  the  social 
humanism  that  is  in  process  of  becoming,  and  with 
the  spiritual  humanism  that  is  to  be. 

Democracy,  political,  industrial,  in  all  its  ex¬ 
tensions,  is  ever  in  danger  from  its  own  transitional 
nature.  The  influences  that  formed  democracy  testi- 


136  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

fy  that  it  is  provisional.  Both  its  achievements 
and  its  failures  manifest  its  need  of  unfolding 
higher  powers.  If  humanity  furls  its  wings  here, 
it  drops  like  lead  into  a  bottomless  abyss.  Our  con¬ 
fidence  is  in  democracy’s  completion  of  itself  in 
social  and  spiritual  humanism. 

§5 

Concerning  this  further  advance  of  humanity, 
two  reflections  are  suggested,  preparatory  to  a 
fuller  treatment  in  the  remaining  chapters. 

The  first  is:  that  we  need  not  despair  of  the 
emergence  of  a  more  developed  social  consciousness 
among  men.  These  are  indeed  days  of  bitter  dis¬ 
illusion,  when  the  world’s  infernal  sufferings  seem 
unrelieved  even  by  celestial  sacrifices..  The  great 
tidal  wave  does  not  raise  permanently  the  surface 
of  the  sea.  Wanderings  through  the  night  bring 
lost  men  back  to  the  dismal  place  they  started 
from.  It  is  indeed  true  that  nothing  else  will  lift 
the  sick  world  up  and  send  it  on  its  way,  except  a 
new  social  consciousness  among  men  and  in  all 
affairs.  Nothing  short  of  a  new  consciousness  of 
international  responsibility  and  privilege  is  suffi¬ 
cient  to  lift  our  own  land  out  of  its  own  peculiar 
infamy.  But  we  have  confidence  in  those  whose 
hearts  humanity  has  touched,  and  in  the  impartive 
power  of  their  social  humanism.  The  progress  of 
mankind  has  been  repeatedly  the  awakening  of  a 
new  consciousness,  though  with  many  turnings 
back  and  retracings  of  the  way.  The  progress  of 
any  human  life  that  really  goes  on  is  by  successive 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


137 


awakenings  to  new  consciousness.  These  are  more 
than  the  natural  advances  of  maturing  years. 
Regeneration  is  the  law  of  progressive  life.  The 
appeal  of  every  prophet  is :  Be  changed  within,  for 
the  new  order  of  life  is  at  hand.  Beneath  the 
purifying  waters  of  sacred  rivers  the  humanity  that 
has  been  sinks  in  voluntary  death,  to  rise  again  in 
new  life.  These  renewals  are  manifest  in  such 
achievements  as  the  passing  of  serfdom,  the  de¬ 
struction  of  slavery,  the  safeguards  thrown  about 
human  life.  These  are  but  precursors  of  more 
indignant  rejections,  as  of  poverty  and  unproduc¬ 
tive  luxury,  and  are  harbingers  of  finer  affirma¬ 
tions,  as  of  equal  opportunity.  These  advances 
blend  into  one  great  new  conviction  which  sweeps 
the  life  of  humanity  along. 

The  humanity  that  lives  again  is  the  humanity 
which  has  died  to  live,  continuing  by  the  law  of 
life  and  resurrection,  losing  life  to  save  it.  The 
new  life  is  the  concentration  of  an  unbroken  proc¬ 
ess,  the  manifestation  of  its  meaning  and  purpose. 
That  which  is  new  is  then  discovered  to  be  that 
which  was  essential  from  the  beginning,  even  as 
those  who  follow  Jesus  into  his  kingdom  return 
to  the  simplicity  of  their  original  nature  and  be¬ 
come  as  little  children. 

It  is  often  said  that  the  prophet,  though  right 
in  his  prediction,  may  easily  be  mistaken  in  the 
time  of  its  fulfillment.  This  is  not  an  exact  state¬ 
ment,  if  his  hope  is  already  fulfilled  in  his  own  soul, 
though  he  cannot  know  the  length  of  the  process 
of  dissemination,  nor  the  future  events  which  may 


138  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

oppose  or  further.  So  the  prophets  of  the  social 
passion  are  not  deceived  when  they  declare  that  a 
new  social  consciousness  is  at  hand,  unfolding  from 
the  interrupted  but  resurgent  democratic  con¬ 
sciousness,  fulfilling  the  humanistic  premonitions 
of  great  phases  of  awakening,  vital  in  an  increasing 
company  of  those  whose  hearts  humanity  has 
touched,  and  further  attested  by  many  enemies. 

The  second  preliminary  reflection  is:  that  this 
social  awakening  is  social  and  spiritual  in  one.  In 
spirituality,  as  I  have  tried  to  trace  out  in  another 
book,*  all  appropriations  of  the  world  must  com¬ 
plete  themselves  by  denying  themselves  and  thus 
transforming  themselves  into  the  human  spirit’s 
transcendence  of  the  world.  Jesus’  life  is  correct¬ 
ly  interpreted  in  the  words,  “I  have  overcome  the 
world.”  This  spirituality  is  not  an  attainment  of 
the  individual  soul  alone  with  God  against  the 
world.  In  whatever  individualistic  consciousness 
the  spiritual  life  may  seem  to  begin,  the  fulfillments 
are  in  social  realizations.  These  fulfillments  dis¬ 
close  social  elements  implicit  from  the  beginning. 
A  spirituality  that  fails  to  unfold  its  social  nature 
tends  either  to  a  mystical  absorption  wherein  it 
contracts  to  nothingness,  or  to  egoism  at  the  ex¬ 
treme  of  selfishness  and  pride.  Not  by  any  un¬ 
social  loss  of  himself  can  a  man  save  himself.  The 
social  spirituality  that  overcomes  the  world  gains 
continually  human  relations  and  interblendings, 
which  flood  the  social  soul  with  inexhaustible  activ¬ 
ities,  devotions,  conflicts,  victories.  This  is  the 

*The  Christian  Reconstruction  of  Modern  Life. 


MODERN  APPROACHES 


139 


victory  that  overcometh  the  world.  Spirituality  is 
essentially  social.  The  overcoming  of  the  world  by 
the  human  spirit  is  the  great  social  cause,  which 
demands  united  devotions.  Every  cause  worthy  of 
devotion  is  of  that  supreme  spiritual  cause.  If  at 
first  there  should  be  only  one  person  loyal  to  the 
cause,  the  cause  itself,  since  it  is  of  social  nature, 
impels  him  to  unite  other  men  in  his  loyalty. 
Though  the  forms  and  immediate  aims  of  a  cause 
worthy  to  be  served  may  seem  to  be  other  than 
spiritual,  these  must  be  directed  to  the  transcendent 
victory  of  the  spirit.  They  fail,  if  insight  into  their 
spiritual  meaning  fails.  The  social  spiritual  task, 
I  hope  to  make  clear,  satisfies  every  religious  need, 
so  satisfying  every  human  need  and  bringing  on 
toward  perfection  all  united  human  powers. 


I 


VII 

THE  RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION 

If  thou  hast  faith  in  one  pure  soul, 

Know  that  thy  faith  hath  made  thee  whole : 

Thou  need'st  not  seek  God's  grace  elsewhere; 
God,  Christ ,  eternal  life  are  there. 

WHAT  are  the  spiritual  implications  of  the 
humanism  which  subordinates  all  things 
to  the  human,  centers  all  things  in  the 
human?  We  saw  at  the  beginning  of  our  path  that 
there  are  in  humanism  implications  of  the  spiritual 
life,  which  is  the  overcoming  of  the  world  and  the 
fulfilling  of  the  soul.  All  along  our  brief  historic 
review  of  humanism,  we  have  been  considering  a 
reality  which  contains  spiritual  potencies,  though 
they  often  present  themselves  under  strange  dis¬ 
guises.  How  do  they  unfold  in  one’s  own  soul,  and 
in  humanity,  in  the  task  of  subordinating  all  things 
to  the  human,  of  centering  all  things  in  the  human? 

§  1 

The  spiritual  potencies  of  humanism  have  a  pur¬ 
pose  in  themselves,  an  object  before  them.  The 
overcoming  of  the  world  and  the  fulfilling  of  the 
soul  constitute  the  cause  we  serve.  All  thought  and 
life  are  to  penetrate,  unfold,  and  realize  the  cause 
we  serve.  The  humanist’s  faith  and  love,  devotion 


140 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  141 


and  worship,  are  supremely  and  inclusively  for  the 
cause  we  serve.  As  we  serve,  that  cause  discloses 
its  social  nature  from  more  to  more. 

There  is  a  singular  variance  between  two  prin¬ 
cipal  meanings  of  the  word  cause.  It  may  mean 
origin,  ground,  or  whatever  synonym  in  the  line  of 
this  significance  one  may  prefer.  Or  it  may  mean 
a  social  end  to  be  devotedly  achieved.  The  religions 
of  the  superhuman  have  made  large  use  of  the 
former  meaning,  in  their  doctrines  of  God.  To 
humanism  the  latter  meaning  is  inevitable  for  the 
highest  that  it  reveres.  There  can  be,  from  the 
humanist’s  point  of  view,  no  comparison  of  moral 
values  between  the  two  meanings.  The  first  seems 
to  him  to  have  in  itself  none,  the  second  to  have 
all.  Yet  the  higher  significance  may  transforming- 
ly  appropriate  the  lower.  The  creator  of  every  good 
in  us  is  the  cause  we  serve. 

In  the  humanist’s  view,  the  quality  of  anything 
is  decided  by  its  outworkings.  So  a  spirituality  is 
to  be  estimated,  not  by  what  it  looks  back  to,  nor 
by  what  it  looks  up  to,  but  by  what  it  works  forward 
to.  I  leave  argument  on  this  principle  to  others. 
I  only  state  the  humanist’s  conviction,  who  is  a 
humanist  because  devotion  to  the  human  seems  to 
him  the  only  life  worth  living.  His  forward  work¬ 
ing  spirituality  has  as  the  cause  it  serves  the  purely 
human  good,  which  is  humanity’s  victory  over  the 
world,  humanity’s  self-fulfillment. 

This  spirituality’s  uplookings  are  for  its  out- 
workings.  It  was  so  with  Jesus,  as  was  made  evi- 


142  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

dent,  I  trust,  in  the  chapter  on  the  Galilean  source 
of  the  social  passion.  He  looked  upward  that  he 
might  make  the  Father’s  will,  directed  to  the 
supreme  purpose,  his  own  will,  and  he  flung  his  life 
into  the  attainment  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  which 
was  the  cause  he  served.  His  God  is  the  holy  will 
of  perfect  love,  with  which  he  blended  his  whole 
soul.  The  quality  of  Jesus’  religion  was  determined 
by  what  he  looked  forward  to  and  worked  for.  When 
the  divine  purpose  is  accepted  with  passive  resigna¬ 
tion,  it  sinks  below  anything  worthy  of  that  holy 
name.  Its  object  must  be  the  cause  to  be  served. 

Our  lookings  back  are  also  for  the  sake  of  the 
workings  on.  This  spirituality  does  not  break 
with  its  own  past,  for  that  would  be  severence  from 
its  own  growing  life.  But  it  uses  the  past  for  the 
supreme  purpose.  If  anything  in  its  past  has 
ceased  to  serve  this  purpose,  it  must  be  recon¬ 
structed  or  even  rejected,  however  venerable,  or 
useful  in  its  day.  The  scriptures,  creeds,  and  in¬ 
stitutions  of  Christianity,  from  which  it  inherits,  it 
estimates  only  by  their  use  or  uselessness  to  the 
cause  we  serve.  When  inherited  conceptions  of 
God  become  inconsistent  with  our  clarifyings  and 
deepenings  of  the  cause  we  serve,  the  former  must 
yield  to  the  latter,  if  the  spiritual  life  is  to  grow. 

Thus  our  attempts  to  describe  the  unfoldings  of 
the  social  into  the  spiritual  have  their  path  marked 
out  for  them.  It  leads  into  the  human  cause  we 
serve,  which  is  humanity’s  self-fulfillment,  wherein 
it  overcomes  the  world. 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  143 


§2 

The  roots  of  humanity's  social  consciousness 
strike  very  deep.  It  has  sources  immeasurably  re¬ 
mote.  In  all  the  spaces  and  times  from  which  the 
constituents  of  our  life  are  gathered,  the  individual 
thing  is  found  only  in  interblendings.  All  things 
flow  into  one  another,  attain  themselves  from  one 
another. 

Most  distinct  seems  a  star,  beating  upon  our 
vision  like  the  throbs  of  a  mighty  heart.  Most 
separate  it  seems,  for  the  glory  nearest  it  is  light- 
years  distant  from  it,  and  the  splendor  which  we 
behold  is  not  of  tonight  or  yesternight,  but  of  years 
away  or  of  centuries  or  millenia  away.  Yet  who 
can  mark  its  boundaries?  If  “a  thing  is  where 
it  acts" — and  the  analysis  of  the  conception  of 
location  seems  to  yield  just  that  equivalence — the 
star  pours  itself  out  through  immensity,  and  all 
that  to  which  its  action  extends  is  interblended 
with  it.  The  light  of  my  vision  which  hails  it  is 
of  it,  and  itself  is  of  my  vision.  The  star  is  of 
my  thought,  and  my  thought  is  of  the  star.  And 
if,  as  humanism  holds,  thought  is  of  life  and  for 
life,  the  star  is  of  my  life  and  my  life  is  of  the  star. 
Each  atom  of  the  star  is  a  universe  to  its  consti¬ 
tuents,  and  if  we  might  penetrate  to  these,  every 
attainment  of  our  science  foretells  that  we  should 
find  them  convergencies  of  forces.  Nor  are  they 
limited  to  the  atom,  their  universe,  for  it  acts  forth 
from  its  own  depths,  sometimes  in  such  vivid  ways 
that  we  can  begin  to  trace  and  measure  its  out¬ 
pourings  of  itself. 


144  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Yet  if  one  says,  because  we  find  no  individual 
thing  existing  in  separateness,  “I  have  gained  the 
ultimate  secret  of  the  One,  I  contemplate  Thee,  O 
Brahm,”  then  all  energies,  all  movements,  which 
are  the  interplay  of  things  that  are  not  merely  one 
being,  disappear  from  our  thought.  Then  for  us 
their  very  being  ceases,  and  not  even  at  the  instant 
when  the  mystic  yields  up  his  consciousness  can  he 
affirm,  “I  contemplate  Thee,  O  Brahm.”  The  con¬ 
ceptions  of  a  monistic  universe  and  a  pluralistic 
universe  (or  universes)  may  find  their  partial 
truths  fulfilled  in  the  social  universe,  of  which  and 
in  which  we  are. 

The  roots  of  the  social  consciousness  strike  very 
deep.  Along  the  stream  of  life  the  individual  thing 
is  found  only  in  interblendings.  The  lowest  forms 
of  life,  from  which  we  come  and  which  have  con¬ 
tinuance  in  us,  search  through  swift  disruptions 
and  associations  for  an  individuality  which  con¬ 
tinually  eludes  them.  Life’s  upward  strivings  for 
distinctness  do  not  make  for  separateness.  In  the 
degree  of  their  increasing  distinctness  are  their 
wider  relations  to  the  world  of  things  and  lives. 
The  growth  of  self-consciousness  in  the  higher 
forms  of  life  is  the  gathering  of  elements  which 
ever  tend  apart,  which  ever  attempt  to  unify  them¬ 
selves,  and  definitely  to  relate  this  slowing  forming 
unity  to  that  which  is  beyond  themselves. 

The  upward  struggle  of  life  is  toward  a  distinct¬ 
ness  which  is  formed  by  wider  and  by  more  intimate 
relations.  The  trend  is  individualistic  and  social 
in  one.  The  phenomenon  of  multiple  personality 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  145 


in  human  beings  may  interpret  to  us  the  effort  of 
the  brute  soul  to  unify  itself.  And  as  a  broken 
human  mind  is  mended  when  its  lost  social  relations 
are  restored,  so  the  individual  life  below  the  human 
strives  socially  to  gain  itself.  This  is  most  evident 
when  the  brute  enters  the  companionship  of  man. 
My  dear  pathetic  dog,  whose  states  of  consciousness 
are  so  ludicrously  irrelevant  to  one  another,  as 
appetites  or  fears  or  angers  disrupt  him  into  all 
kinds  of  dog,  looks  up  exultantly  when  my  voice 
calls  his  name,  or  at  the  summons  his  eyes  seek 
mine,  yearning,  inscrutable,  devoted.  I  am  calling 
him  into  the  centralizing  of  his  unstable  conscious¬ 
ness,  and  with  that,  into  a  new  social  world,  whose 
master  impulse  for  him  is  to  lay  down  his  life, 
attained  through  me,  for  me,  his  creative  lord  of 
life.  It  is  his  task  to  lead  me,  sympathetic,  com¬ 
passionate,  into  the  life  beneath  me.  How  well  he 
leads,  how  lamely  I  follow,  to  that  neglected  attain¬ 
ment  without  which  my  personality  lacks  an 
essential!  My  task  is  to  lead  him  into  my  higher 
life  than  his.  How  poor  is  my  leading,  how  brave 
his  bewildered,  trustful  following!  Would  that  I 
might  be  as  faithful  in  following  my  guides,  and 
the  supreme  of  them,  into  a  consciousness  undis¬ 
rupted  by  anything  that  is  not  human,  into  a 
personal  life  which  continually  gathers  itself,  con¬ 
tinually  imparts  itself,  and  so  achieves  itself  from 
and  in  and  unto  the  fellowship  of  interblended  souls, 
the  social  universe! 

When  life  advances  into  the  human,  all  human 
forces  socially  combine  to  work  for  personality.  All 


146  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

forces  which  the  human  appropriates  from  lower 
orders  of  life  and  existence  it  turns  to  the  making 
of  personal  souls.  Personal  beings  unite  their 
powers  to  this  end.  The  mother  uses  the  long  help¬ 
lessness  of  human  infancy,  and  the  long  dependence 
of  human  childhood,  to  pour  her  life  into  the  child’s 
life.  That  which  she  has  is  gathered  from  other 
souls,  themselves  recipients  of  still  others,  in  vast 
successions  and  social  interblendings.  Her  appro¬ 
priation,  which  she  imparts,  includes  the  remoter 
transformed  inheritances  from  the  lower  than 
human  life.  Thus  humanity  is  motherhood  in  every 
motherhood.  Each  soul  is  derived  from  humanity’s 
interblended  personal  life,  and  from  spaces  and 
ages  which  that  life  has  made  its  own.  In  the  ex¬ 
ultant  fellowship  of  every  such  creation,  the  morn¬ 
ing  stars  sing  together  and  all  the  sons  of  God 
shout  for  joy. 

When  we  reflect  upon  the  mystery  of  our  birth, 
neither  ignoring  physical  facts  nor  estimating  them 
carnally,  it  is  dignity  enough  that  we  come,  “trailing 
clouds  of  glory,”  from  humanity,  not  from  any 
superhuman  God,  that  we  have  our  being  In  human¬ 
ity,  and  that  our  life  flows  out  to  humanity.  For 
in  each  new  soul  all  its  inheritances  become  new. 
Each  human  soul  in  its  own  peculiar  life  is  a  new 
universe  formed  from  other  universes,  and  its  ful¬ 
fillment  is  to  form  itself  from  them  all,  blending 
into  itself,  and  so  transcending,  the  interblended 
life  of  all.  Thus  the  individualistic  impulse  of  the 
renaissance  is  vastly  justified  and  completed.  The 
whole  human  universe,  with  all  the  inheritances 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


147 


which  it  has  humanized,  is  for  each  new  soul.  And 
each  new  soul,  in  its  own  personality,  is  an  advance 
from  all  that  has  contributed  to  it. 

By  the  same  law,  each  soul  is  for  the  formation 
of  other  souls,  is  for  humanity's  personally  inter- 
blended  life.  This  is  the  social  consciousness,  the 
social  passion.  It  is  spiritual,  but  not  as  seeking 
above  the  human  its  origin,  energy,  law,  or  purpose. 
It  energizes  unto  the  fulfillment  of  the  human  in 
the  conquest  and  transcendence  of  the  world,  and 
in  the  illimitable  developments  of  the  human  in 
each  and  all.  This  is  the  object  of  our  spiritual 
faith.  This  is  the  religion  of  the  social  passion. 
This  is  the  cause  we  serve.* 

Some  familiar  elements  suggest  themselves  of 
the  formation  of  a  man  from  other  men,  and  of  his 
forming  of  other  men  from  himself.  The  first  of 
these  two  aspects  of  human  life  is  attempted  here. 
The  second  will  be  undertaken  in  the  next  chapter. 

§  3 

Before  the  memories  which  mature  years  dis¬ 
criminatingly  recall,  the  soul  begins  its  task  of 
forming  itself  from  the  great  interblended  human 
life.  The  new-born  child,  fresh  heritage  from 
humanity's  inexhaustible,  continually  self-creative 
life,  awaits  a  second  birth,  which  is  the  beginning 
of  its  own  realization  of  the  social  consciousness. 

*It  does  not  belong  to  my  task  to  discuss  the  psychological  and 
metaphysical  problems  which  suggest  themselves  at  this  point.  T 
am  not  conscious  of  any  evasion  of  them  in  my  own  thinking.  Will 
kind  critics  not  discover  in  what  I  write  implications  which  are 
not  there.  In  particular,  I  am  not  entangled  in  the  error— as  human¬ 
ists  must  regard  it — of  attempting  to  unite  persons  into  a  moni¬ 
stically  conceived  somewhat  alien  to  them. 


148  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

In  this  is  the  dawning  of  the  personal  consciousness, 
which  socially  forms  itself  from  the  impartings  of 
the  mother’s  soul.  Spiritually  creative  is  the  cumula¬ 
tive  moment  when  the  child  knows  her,  not  merely 
with  the  animal  instinct  that  turns  to  her  life- 
giving  breast,  but  with  the  recognition  of  heart 
forming  itself  from  her  heart,  of  mind  forming 
itself  from  her  mind,  of  soul  forming  itself  from 
her  soul. 

From  that  moment  the  child  takes  from  her  more 
and  more  of  the  gift,  which  is  continously  graduated 
to  its  increasing  capacity.  Each  successive  imparta- 
tion  must  in  no  wise  repress,  but  altogether  develop, 
that  concentration  of  life  which  we  call  a  person, 
as  the  mother  is  careful  not  to  impose  herself,  but 
to  impart  herself  and  the  spiritual  universe  of 
which  she  is  mediator.  The  impartation  is  for  such 
a  concentration  of  the  social  universe  as  may  be¬ 
come  a  personal  enlargement  of  this  universe,  a 
contribution  to  its  vast  developments.  If  she  is 
self-indulgently  remiss  or  thoughtless,  if  she  trivi¬ 
ally  or  ambitiously  prefers  other  things  or  other 
social  services  to  this  most  intimate  and  intensive 
contribution  to  the  spiritual  universe,  she  becomes 
less  than  the  brute  mother.  Therefore  she  must 
continually  renew  and  enlarge  that  which  she  has 
to  give.  She  may  not  shut  herself  off  from  any¬ 
thing  in  human  life  that  is  impartive  to  her  of  that 
which  she  must  impart. 

When  poverty  or  any  other  repression  despoils 
her  of  time  and  power  for  this  self-giving,  and  for 
self-receiving  that  she  may  give,  then  the  wrong 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  149 


and  folly  of  our  present  economic  conditions  are 
most  evident.  The  energies  of  social  reform  will 
do  well  to  concentrate  themselves  upon  the  mother 
and  her  child.  The  education  of  women,  which  has 
been  misshapen  by  the  economic  exigencies  of  an 
unhumanistic  time,  must  have  this  as  interpretive 
and  directive  aim.  This  reflection  applies  not  only 
to  those  who  are  mothers  in  the  full  sense,  which 
includes  and  transcends  the  physical,  but  to  all 
women  in  every  motherly  occupation,  as  teaching, 
domestic  service  socially  humanized,  and  everything 
in  the  world’s  work  where  there  is  need  of  mother¬ 
ing.  All  women  have  the  right  to  scope  and  re¬ 
sources  for  spiritual  motherhood. 

Because  her  giving  of  humanity  must  become 
ultimately  the  task  of  all  souls  united  for  the  in¬ 
creasing  creation  of  each  soul,  she  magnanimously 
welcomes  assistants  in  her  task,  demanding  only 
that  they  shall  assist  indeed.  The  most  eminent  of 
her  associates  is  normally  the  father,  in  the  ethical 
romance  that  unites  man  and  woman  in  one  spirit¬ 
ual  task.  The  next  rank  belongs  to  whatever  com¬ 
petent  children  are  available.  For  childhood  has 
its  own  secret  of  the  impartation  of  humanity  to  a 
child.  If  there  are  other  children  in  the  home,  their 
fulfillment  of  this  function  is  the  most  distinguish¬ 
ed.  But  there  should  also  be  enlisted,  under  her 
watchful  and  liberal  selection,  all  sorts  and  con¬ 
ditions  of  children,  in  their  wisdom  to  impart  child- 
life  in  great  variety  and  unexpectedness.  Among 
these  the  mother  again  is  chief,  newborn  to  child¬ 
likeness  with  the  child’s  birth.  All  his  life  long 


150  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

the  child  richly  and  purely  receives  humanity  from 
her  mediation.  And  her  impartive  task  is  per¬ 
formed  most  effectively  when  her  physical  presence 
no  longer  glorifies  the  earth. 

The  most  intimate  of  these  impartations  even 
poets  and  artists  must  render  with  the  reserve 
which  is  the  test  of  their  insight.  Common  speech 
dares  to  express  receptions  from  motherhood  only 
objectively  and  generally.  Such  reverence  must  be 
offered  to  those  few  who  are  heart  of  a  man’s  heart, 
soul  of  his  soul,  or  to  that  one.  The  intensest  of 
creative  words  it  is  not  lawful  to  utter.  They  are 
spoken  in  more  august  sanctuaries  than  the  Para¬ 
dise  beyond  the  Third  Heaven.  Impartings  of  soul 
to  soul  more  fateful  than  the  seven  thunders  of 
the  Apocalypse  must,  like  them,  remain  forever  un¬ 
written.  Yet  the  soul’s  inviolable  sanctuary  is  a 
social  creation.  For  the  thrice-holy  abiding  pres¬ 
ences  built  it  with  that  which  they  brought  from 
the  universal  life  of  humanity. 

There  cannot  be  too  intense  a  receptivity  to  a 
great,  pure  soul.  The  religions  of  a  superhuman 
God  have  admonished  men  against  cherishing  for  a 
human  being  a  faith  too  pure,  or  a  love  too  devoted, 
lest  we  set  a  creature  in  the  Creator’s  place.  We 
have  been  warned  and  threatened  not  to  permit  a 
human  being  to  interpose  between  God  and  our¬ 
selves,  not  to  be  diverted  from  the  singleness  of 
a  divine  dependence.  Though  Christ  is  often  ex¬ 
cepted,  it  is  on  the  ground  of  his  alleged  divine 
nature.  In  the  higher  forms  of  this  instruction, 
we  are  told  that  the  supreme  human  souls 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


151 


are  stepping-stones  to  God's  throne.  Even 
the  finest  forms  of  this  doctrine  chill  hu¬ 
manity  to  the  heart.  The  humanist  admits 
no  disparagement  of  trust  and  love  to  the  human. 
A  soul  whom  we  trust  and  love  does  not  point  us 
away  from  himself  to  the  superhuman.  He  invites 
us  to  enter  ever  more  deeply  into  the  humanity 
which  he  has  made  his  own.  Of  this  spiritual  life 
of  humanity  in  receptive  and  impartive  lives  Jesus 
is  representative,  not  the  Christ  of  the  two  natures, 
the  divine  overwhelming  the  human,  but  the  human 
Jesus. 

In  the  degree  next  the  highest,  it  is  our  friends 
who  have  been  to  us  mediators  of  the  human.*  Per¬ 
haps  the  greatest  word  concerning  friendship  is 
that  which  is  attributed  to  Jesus,  not  unworthily, 
in  the  Fourth  Gospel:  ‘‘I  have  called  you  friends, 
for  all  things  that  I  have  heard  of  my  Father  I  have 
made  known  unto  you."  The  office  of  friendship 
is  to  make  known,  in  the  fourth  evangelist's  vital 
significance  of  knowledge,  that  which  has  been  re¬ 
ceived  of  the  Father.  And  the  humanist  may,  as 
we  will  reflect  later,  find  this  fatherhood  in  the 
concrete  humanity  of  which  we  are.  That  making 
known  is  no  merely  intellectual  instruction.  It  Is 
love's  self-imparting.  Its  purpose  is,  “As  thou, 
Father,  art  in  me  and  I  in  thee,  that  they  also  may 
be  one  in  us."  The  office  of  friends,  who  must  first 
receive,  is  such  a  transmission  of  humanity  that 

♦The  course  of  this  chapter  is  not  formally  directed  by  group 
classifications.  I  trust  that  my  more  personal  method  may  not  be 
found  to.  be  inconsistent  with  those  valuable  contributions  to  social 
science,  in  some  of  which  the  treatment  is  too  mechanical. 


152  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


our  life  may  become  socially  one  with  theirs,  may 
become  the  increasing  love-life  of  mankind. 

These  our  friends  have  been  reverent  of  us  in 
their  desire,  that,  for  our  sake  and  humanity's  sake, 
their  gifts  of  humanity  should  contribute  to  the 
concentration  of  a  full-formed  personality.  If  any 
of  them  have  tried  to  limit  us  by  imposing  them¬ 
selves  upon  us,  let  this  offense  be  lost  in  their  true 
fulfillments  of  friendship.  May  we  be  forgiven  for 
our  thwartings  of  their  high  endeavor,  if  we  have 
imitated  them  or  made  them  authorities.  If  we 
have  become  in  any  wise  estranged  from  them,  by 
their  defects  or  our  own  unworthiness,  by  sordid 
frets  or  material  aims,  by  pride,  insensibility  or 
self-conceit,  or  by  forgetfulness  because  of  any  dis¬ 
tance  or  lapse  of  time  or  their  irremediable  absence 
from  our  sight,  may  they  renew  their  benefactions, 
as  we  reascend  these  downward  paths,  taking  back 
to  them,  though  it  be  but  to  their  living  memories, 
the  deepened  appreciations  of  our  repentant  faith! 

Various  have  been  their  gifts,  as  their  capacities 
to  impart  humanity  were  varied.  One  brought  us 
men's  laughter,  another  human  tears,  another  com¬ 
passions,  another  fortitudes.  Later  experience  often 
discovers  that  they  are  most  deserving  of  gratitude 
whose  enrichments  of  us  were  almost  disregarded. 
We  trace  back  the  best  that  is  in  us  not  only  to 
the  illumination  of  our  friend  the  seer,  and  to  the 
inspiration  of  our  friend  the  hero,  but  also  to  the 
prattle  of  our  friend  the  little  child,  and  to  the  un¬ 
conscious  impartations  of  the  fundamental  worths 
by  our  friends  who  were  common  men.  Happy  is 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  153 

he  whose  friends  have  sounded  most  variously  the 
scale  of  the  human  music,  making  him  most  broadly, 
deeply,  simply  human. 

It  is  remembered  of  Phillips  Brooks  that  in  his 
vacations  he  would  sometimes  slip  back  to  the  city 
to  which  he  gave  the  best  things,  and  from  a  win¬ 
dow  of  one  of  the  busiest  streets,  at  the  hour  most 
thronged,  watch  the  crowd  pass  by.  From  all  sorts 
and  conditions  of  men,  women,  and  children,  from 
their  faces  and  movements,  expressive  of  nobility 
or  baseness,  success  or  defeat,  ambition,  apathy,  or 
discontent,  aspiration  or  self-satisfaction,  service¬ 
ableness  or  selfishness,  he  drew  most  variously  the 
flood  of  human  life  into  his  own  soul,  that  he  might 
pour  it  forth,  deeply  interpreted  and  purely  ful¬ 
filled,  for  manifold  enrichments  of  the  humanity 
from  which  he  continually  formed  himself. 

No  less  revered  than  the  friends  whom  wre  have 
seen  are  the  friends  whom,  not  having  seen,  we 
love,  the  thinkers,  composers,  artists,  who  fulfill  the 
highest  offices  of  friendship  to  multitudes  and  cen¬ 
turies.  They  blended  into  themselves  men’s 
thoughts  and  dreams,  storm  and  repose,  great 
moments  and  common  days.  Their  originality  sig¬ 
nifies  their  power  to  receive  from  the  human  its 
obscure  potencies,  unsuspected  combinations,  and 
to  bestow  them  expressively  upon  generations  of 
receptive  hearts.  With  these  benefactors  we  asso¬ 
ciate  the  inspirers  of  motives,  the  prophets  of  great 
causes,  the  leaders  of  progressive  eras.  The  world’s 
heroes  advance  humanity  to  great  new  creations 
in  their  own  personalities,  so  that  great  new  crea- 


154  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


tions  may  issue  from  them.  In  all  humility  we  be¬ 
seech  them  to  call  us  friends,  that  all  things  which 
they  have  received  they  may  give  to  us. 

Gratitude  can  be  felt  only  for  gifts  of  soul.  To 
receive  into  my  own  life  a  fellow-man's  contribu¬ 
tion  of  life  is  itself  an  act  of  gratitude.  To  reject 
it  is  ingratitude.  One  must  never  slight  a  present 
from  a  child  or  a  childlike  person,  though  it  be  in 
itself  useless  or  cumbersome,  for  the  soul  is  given 
with  it.  If  I  am  ignorant  of  the  source  of  any  vital 
good,  or  if,  in  the  confusions  of  affairs,  I  have  for¬ 
gotten  one  who  was  such  a  giver,  the  ignorance  or 
forgetfulness  decreases  the  value  of  that  which  I 
have  received ;  but  when  the  knowledge  is  gained  or 
the  recognition  revived,  then  the  gift  is  multiplied. 
If  the  imparting  to  me  of  any  inward  power  and 
joy  is  accompanied  with  a  material  object,  as  its 
instrument  or  embodiment,  then  the  material  good 
is  sacramental,  and  is  to  be  used  for  riches  of  the 
soul.  A  spiritual  interest  must  be  in  the  heart  of 
the  giver  of  the  simplest  thing,  the  most  ordinary 
service,  and  a  spiritual  benefit  must  be  imparted, 
as  in  the  cup  of  cold  water  given  in  the  name  of  a 
disciple;  else  even  the  builder  of  aqueducts  shall 
have  no  reward. 

A  large  part  of  the  complaints  of  those  who 
would  be  called  benefactors,  against  the  ingratitude 
of  men,  may  be  therefore  without  foundation.  It 
is  salutary  to  ap|fly  this  reflection  to  our  own  casti¬ 
gations  of  thi^e  whom  we  accuse  of  thanklessness 
to  ourselvesjjf/  Only  the  soul  can  be  grateful,  not 
filled  stomach  or  warmed  skin,  and  the  soul  can  be 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION  155 


grateful  only  to  enriching  souls.  Did  many  of  us 
who  have  been  college  boys  feel  a  responsive  thrill, 
when  we  read  upon  ornate  facades  the  highly  re¬ 
lieved  names  of  donors,  unless  it  was  the  name  of 
one  whose  building  we  knew  ourselves  to  be  ? 
When  the  college  president  felt  constrained  to 
stand  a  distinguished  philanthropist  up  before  us, 
and  grandiloquently  to  recite  his  munificence,  how 
much  thankfulness  irradiated  our  faces,  unless 
there  was  something  in  the  victim  of  the  eulogy 
which  told  us  that  he  himself  was  ours  and  was 
worth  the  taking!  It  is  the  impecunious  mediator 
of  the  large  endowments  who  is  thanked  for  them, 
when  they  are  the  occasion  of  his  giving  that  in 
himself  which  is  a  richer  gift  than  those  things. 
How  many  rich  men's  sons  repay  with  gratitude 
the  monies  lavished  upon  them  by  fathers  who 
gave  no  personal  good,  until  the  son’s  discovery,  as 
frequently  set  forth  in  affecting  tales,  that  there 
was  a  soul  in  the  lavishness?  None  are  so  ungrate¬ 
ful  as  beggars  snatching  a  gift  bare  of  the  giver; 
or  there  is  offered  with  the  dole  superficial  senti¬ 
mentality  or  condescending  pity;  and  none  has  a 
better  right  to  be  ungrateful,  among  the  great  host 
of  those  who  are  robbed  of  soul  by  the  gift  of, 
things.  The  scatterer  of  millions  for  object^fSw- 
ever  worthy  is  met  by  the  challenge:  |^Wnat  are 
you  yourself,  and  what  floods  of  good  and  evil  have 
poured  into  humanity  from  your  acquisitive 
career?  The  splendid  temple  at  Jerusalem  was 
dear  to  Jesus,  but  we  find  no  word  of  his  in  recog¬ 
nition  of  the  Herod  who  built  it  at  prodigious  cost. 


156  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


Even  the  contributors  of  a  knowledge  or  a  power 
which  is  not  their  inmost  life  win  little  gratitude. 

If  the  giver  of  wealth  has  given  himself,  having 
a  self  to  give,  no  envy  or  obloquy  can  keep  him  long 
from  his  reward.  The  proverbial  ingratitude  of 
republics  should  be  thus  discriminated.  This  is  in 
truth  their  ingratitude,  that  they  so  often  reject 
the  thought,  the  heart,  the  purpose,  of  a  lover  of  his 
country.  But  when  they  at  length  accept  these — 
the  soul  of  Abraham  Lincoln  is  not  poor  in  the  good 
measure,  pressed  down,  shaken  together,  and  run¬ 
ning  over,  which  men  give  into  his  bosom.  What 
thanksgiving  do  we  owe  to  a  deity  whose  gifts,  ex¬ 
ternal  to  himself,  cost  him  nothing!  When  we  dis¬ 
cover  that  every  gift  of  his  is  love’s  supreme,  holy, 
sacrificial  self-imparting,  then  our  hearts  are  his. 

We  must  gain  ourselves  not  only  from  our 
friends,  but  also  from  our  enemies.  An  enemy  is 
one  who  attempts  the  twofold  injury,  to  repress 
our  personal  life  and  to  rob  us  of  our  inheritance 
of  humanity.  He  may  work  his  mischief  unwit¬ 
tingly,  or  in  a  foolish  conceit  of  bestowing  favor, 
or  with  premeditated  malice,  or  with  insensibility. 
He  may  be  thief,  murderer,  seducer,  or  false 
teacher,  blind  guide,  who  in  church  or  state  or 
school,  in  home  or  business,  imposes  his  own 
small  measurements  upon  us.  Some,  who  are  in 
the  main  beneficent  friends,  mistake  in  certain  re¬ 
spects  the  nature  of  their  service.  May  none  of  us 
be  such  enemies,  even  in  the  least  degree,  of  those 
whom  we  love,  as  to  try  to  fashion  them  into  the 
likeness  of  our  own  limitations!  The  worst  of  our 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


157 


enemies  are  the  Hohenzollerns,  in  high  place  or  low 
place,  or  sunk  from  a  high  place  to  eternal  infamy. 
They  go  forth  to  destroy  men's  personality  and 
human  heritage,  to  make  each  individual  and  all 
humanity  a  smaller  and  baser  thing.  Yet  even 
those  worst  can  be  made  to  contribute  to  our  riches 
of  the  soul. 

We  gain  from  our  enemies  the  necessity  of 
guarding  ourselves  against  them.  They  compel  us 
to  distinguish  between  the  human  and  the  inhuman, 
between  those  things  which  increase  life  and  those 
which  diminish  it.  Each  holy  city  has  twelve  gates, 
is  trebly  accessible  on  every  side.  To  each  gate  are 
brought  the  glory  and  honor  of  the  nations,  and 
the  riches  of  their  kings.  Against  each  entrance 
violations  and  importunities  storm  or  crawl.  There¬ 
fore  at  each  gate  is  stationed  a  strong  angel,  to  re¬ 
ceive  and  to  exclude.  Because  of  this  enforced  dis¬ 
crimination,  the  acceptance  of  the  glorious  things 
is  no  passive  acquiescence,  but  a  discriminating  ap¬ 
propriation.  The  sentineled  soul  is  made  wise  and 
strong  by  this  necessity  of  selection. 

Our  enemies  awaken  in  us  a  higher  purpose :  that 
we  will  not  separate  ourselves  from  them.  We  will 
not  exclude  what  they  may  beneficently  become  to 
us,  nor  withhold  that  which  we  may  be  to  them. 
For  every  man,  whatever  he  is,  is  potentially  a  new 
constituent  of  humanity,  an  original  essential  of  its 
enlarging  life.  To  separate  oneself'  from  any  man 
is  therefore  suicidal.  To  be  estranged  from  one 
who  has  been  our  friend  is  among  the  most  poign¬ 
ant  of  disasters ;  or  if  we  have  ceased  to  care,  some- 


158  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

thing  in  us  has  died.  To  be  estranged  from  one 
still  closer  would  be  the  most  unendurable  of 
agonies.  Yet  the  consciousness  of  loss  stirs  in  us, 
not  always  faintly,  at  the  exclusion  from  us  of  the 
man  who  least  appeals  to  us.  This  loss  from  our 
own  selves  is  felt  whenever  we  see  the  isolation  of 
an  enemy  of  mankind;  as  by  a  criminal's  imprison¬ 
ment,  or  by  the  infliction  of  the  death  penalty  upon 
a  murderer;  or  when  the  execration  of  mankind 
drives  its  betrayer  into  the  outer  darkness.  Even 
then  we  and  humanity,  whose  life  beats  in  us,  have 
lost  something  necessary  to  us.  When  we  exclude 
a  destroyer  of  the  human,  we  lose  something  human 
in  that  destroyer.  W~e  are  not  without  hope  that 
the  utmost  necessary  severity  may  in  every  case 
stop  short  of  the  elimination  of  the  offender;  that 
underneath  the  destructive  force  which  for  human¬ 
ity’s  sake  we  are  compelled  to  destroy,  there  may 
be  found  a  constituent  of  humanity,  when  the  un¬ 
human  of  him  has  been  swept  away.  Even  for  our 
own  sakes  we  cannot  believe  in  the  final  perdition 
of  any  soul.  Every  soul  is  indispensable  to  every 
soul,  for  to  lose  any  soul  is  to  lose  something  of  the 
humanity  from  which  we  are.  This  loss  was  an¬ 
nounced  by  Jesus,  when  he  taught  that  every  act 
or  word  or  sentiment  which  tends  to  separate  us 
from  our  fellow  men  endangers  the  soul  that  pro¬ 
nounces  the  separation ;  and  that  the  utterly  sepa¬ 
rative  contempt,  which  is  congealed  hate,  makes  us 
liable  to  the  extreme  spiritual  disaster. 

Yet  if  we  suffer  the  gates  to  be  forced  by  the 
onrush  or  the  wiles  of  our  enemies,  then  every  per- 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


159 


sonal  sanctity  is  betrayed,  and  we  commit  against 
humanity  the  treachery  which  Belgium  spurned. 
Only  a  redemptive  forgiveness  can  transcend  this 
dilemma  and  accomplish  humanity’s  hardest  task. 
But  this  thought  leads  us  beyond  the  subject  of  this 
chapter. 

Out  among  throngs  of  men,  into  the  welter  of 
human  interrelations,  we  go  armed  against  intru¬ 
sions,  impertinences,  hasty  confidences,  usurpa¬ 
tions  of  authority,  assaults  upon  the  personal  rights 
which  a  man  must  maintain,  not  for  himself  alone. 
All  these  diminish  men.  They  prevent  the  true 
participations.  We  cultivate  self-defense  and  re¬ 
ceptivity,  the  former  for  the  sake  of  the  latter. 

He  can  give  little  who  receives  little.  Many  a 
stupid  philanthropist’s  zeal  to  give  to  needy  men  is 
thwarted  by  his  failure  to  receive  the  understand¬ 
ing  of  them.  Many  a  teacher  fails  because  of  in¬ 
ability  to  learn  the  wisdom  of  the  simple.  As 
repellant  as  hate  is  the  stupidity  of  those  who  find 
men  or  any  man  uninteresting — when  we  get  below 
the  artificial  and  mechanical  to  the  humanity  of 
him. 

We  are  creditors,  as  well  as  debtors,  of  all  sorts 
and  conditions  of  men.  Unless  we  collect  what  men 
owe  us  we  shall  have  nothing  wherewith  to  pay  our 
debts  to  men.  From  men  of  different  nationalities, 
different  opportunities  of  culture,  various  ages  of 
life,  diverse  pursuits  and  experiences  and  social 
status — so  long  as  that  bar  against  the  tides  of  life 
continues — we  must  receive.  Among  events  we 
welcome,  as  mightily  formative  of  us,  those  which 


160  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

reveal  in  greatest  variety  the  universal  human;  as 
when  a  crowd  becomes  one  variously  pulsating 
tenderness  around  an  injured  child;  or  as  when  a 
variegated  democracy  fulfills,  though  only  for  a 
little  while,  its  social  implications  by  “men  meeting 
at  their  summits”  in  a  superb  devotion.  From  the 
pathos  of  humanity  we  must  form  ourselves,  es¬ 
pecially  when,  as  in  the  world  war,  human  suffer¬ 
ing  becomes  the  inexhaustible  spring  of  heroism. 
With  infinite  vibrations  the  hearts  of  men  pene¬ 
trate  our  hearts.  It  is  nothing  abstract,  conceptual, 
which  we  feel  creative  of  our  enlarging  selves.  We 
are  wrought  from  individual  pains  and  overcom¬ 
ings,  which  are  so  blended  together  that  each  of 
them  becomes  the  more  distinct  by  its  relations. 

Our  sharings  of  men’s  life,  present  and  past, 
open  to  us  the  hope  of  fulfillments  of  our  lives  from 
souls  and  generations  of  the  future.  Personality 
is  from  all  men  who  are  and  from  all  who  have 
been  and  from  all  who  are  to  come.  This  greeting 
to  every  soul  is  implicit  in  every  soul :  I  am  thine 
and  thou  art  mine,  that  we  all  may  become  perfect 
in  one. 

This  formation  of  social  personality  is  gained 
from  groups  of  men,  as  from  one’s  family,  circle, 
neighborhood,  community,  industrial  combination, 
professional  fellowship,  transitory  or  permanent 
poolings  of  interests,  organizations  for  cultural 
ends,  state,  country,  race.  The  fundamental  ques¬ 
tion  in  these  and  other  groupings  is,  whether  we 
receive  from  them  human  impartations  to  which 
their  material  objects  are  made  ministrant.  Are 


RECEPTIVE  FAITH  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


161 


they  so  organized  that  each  man  receives  from 
them  his  personal  social  self? 

Each  group  must  serve  the  groups  that  include 
it,  if  this  aim  is  to  be  attained.  A  class  conscious¬ 
ness,  a  national  or  a  racial  consciousness,  may  be 
either  creative  or  destructive  of  the  human.  An 
organization  of  labor  or  capital  which  does  not 
minister  to  the  higher  unities  is  doomed  by  its  sepa¬ 
rateness  from  humanity.  A  patriotism  which  is 
not  thus  cosmopolitan  robs  its  country  of  that 
which  assures  men’s  loyalty.  But  when  a  group 
consciousness,  while  concentrating  and  creating 
human  powers  for  its  own  tasks,  relates  them  to 
the  higher  unities,  it  then  has  earned  recognition 
and  co-operation.  When  one  of  the  higher  unities, 
our  mother-country  above  them  all,  devotes  itself 
and  all  which  it  includes  to  the  supreme  cause  we 
serve,  no  faith  in  that  glorious  mediator  of  the 
human  can  be  too  receptive,  no  loyalty  too  sacri¬ 
ficial. 

“O  Beautiful,  My  Country,  .  .  . 

What  were  our  lives  without  thee! 

What  all  our  lives  to  save  thee ! 

We  reck  not  what  we  gave  thee, 

We  will  not  dare  to  doubt  thee, 

But  ask  whatever  else  and  we  will  dare.” 


VIII 


THE  IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  THE  SOCIAL 

PASSION 

Pour  out  thy  rill  of  life ,  and  it  shall  be 
Unsounded  oceans  surging  back  to  thee. 

§1 

EACH  personality  then  is  formed,  through  the 
impartings  of  other  personalities,  from 
humanity's  interblended  life.  A  deeper  so¬ 
cial  consciousness  than  we  have  yet  considered 
may  make  clear  the  distinction  between  the  human 
that  enlarges  our  personality  and  the  inhuman  in¬ 
trusions  that  diminish  it.  With  this  distinction 
anticipated,  one  may  say:  an  essential  part  of  my 
life  task  is  to  bring  into  my  continually  increasing 
personality  every  life  which  touches  mine,  and  the 
lives  which  directly  or  mediately  form  every  life 
that  contributes  to  mine.  These  formations  of  a 
person  come  from  as  far  as  there  are  human  be¬ 
ings,  forming  one  another.  All  that  humanity  is, 
or  rather  may  become,  in  all  souls,  each  soul  must 
strive  to  become,  and  each  soul  must  also  be  a  new 
creation,  concentration  and  advance  of  humanity. 
A  soul  can  accept  no  nearer,  lower  goal  of  its  own 
becoming.  Though  inimitably  distant,  toward  that 
must  each  man  go  on,  finding  his  progress  to  be 
continual  increase  of  worth  and  joy. 

These  contributions  of  the  human  to  one's  own 
soul  can  never,  we  reflected,  be  from  humanity  in 


162 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


163 


any  abstract,  conceptual  sense.  They  cannot  re¬ 
duce  a  man  to  a  phase  of  humanity,  as  in  the  brute 
world  the  individual  is  regarded  by  some,  though 
superficially,  as  merely  for  the  species.  The  im- 
partings  of  humanity,  however  great  and  many 
they  grow  to  be,  cannot  overwhelm  or  in  any  de¬ 
gree  depersonalize.  If  it  seems  so,  in  suicidal  imi¬ 
tations,  servile  acceptances  of  authority,  weak  sub¬ 
missions  to  a  more  aggressive  will,  it  is  not  then 
the  human  that  is  accepted.  We  then  let  in  the  de¬ 
personalized  things,  which  those  who  are  perverted 
from  the  human  would  force  upon  other  men,  while 
whatever  humanity  there  is  in  the  suppressor 
stands  aloof,  unimpartive.  Whenever  the  human 
is  received,  the  personal  life  of  the  recipient  be¬ 
comes  more  distinct,  intense,  in  the  measure  of  the 
reception.  Your  personal  being  is  a  social  con¬ 
sciousness.  The  intensifying  of  your  life  is  a  social 
passion.  It  is  humanity  that  you  confess,  it  is  the 
social  life  that  you  experience,  it  is  the  social  pas¬ 
sion  that  burns  within  you,  when,  with  a  limitless 
aspiration,  you  dare  to  say:  I  am  a  man. 

But  when  this  is  said,  much  more  is  implied  than 
the  mere  receiving  of  ourselves  from  humanity. 
For,  obviously,  when  a  man  receives  himself  from 
others,  they  give  themselves  to  him.  The  story  of 
the  formation  of  each  man  from  other  men  might 
be  told  conversely,  as  the  imparting  of  those  lives 
and  their  content  of  humanity.  And  he  who  receives 
himself  gives  himself  in  the  receiving.  Faith,  the 
receptive  power,  is  self-surrender  to  that  which  it 
receives.  If  faith  were  for  the  sake  of  some  ex- 


164  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

ternal  good,  either  here  or  hereafter,  something  not 
our  very  selves,  there  would  not  necessarily  be  in¬ 
volved  the  giving  of  our  inmost  selves.  The  human 
faith  that  receives  its  own  soul  from  humanity  and 
its  personal  mediators,  receives  those  who  are  loved 
and  their  content  of  humanity.  And  every  one  who 
gives  himself  receives  himself  from  him  to  whom 
he  gives.  The  humanity  which  is  the  interblended 
life  of  human  souls  is  enriched  by  every  giving. 

The  receptive  element  of  our  becoming  is  itself 
impartive,  because  the  very  thing  received  by  faith 
is  the  self-impartive  life.  It  is  love  that  is  given 
us  from  motherhood,  friendship,  and  the  inconspic¬ 
uous  contributions  of  common  men.  Unless  I  re¬ 
ceive  self-impartive  love,  I  receive  not  anything 
essential  to  human  worth.  And  I  can  receive  it 
only  as  the  self-impartive  love-life  of  my  own  soul. 

Thus  every  element  and  aspect  of  a  life  that  is 
truly  human  is  a  self-imparting.  Even  when  we 
most  receive,  it  is  by  giving  ourselves  that  we  re¬ 
ceive.  The  imparting  of  ourselves  is  the  increase 
of  ourselves.  This  life  gains  strength  by  action, 
and  its  action  is  the  imparting  of  itself.  All  at¬ 
tempts  to  enlarge  our  lives  in  opposition  to  this 
principle,  as  those  of  a  self-centered  culture  or  an 
egotistic  ambition,  penetrate  life  with  fatal  mala¬ 
dies,  undermine  its  foundations.  It  cannot  be  oth¬ 
erwise,  for  personality  is  socially  formed  and  of 
social  nature,  and  the  social  as  such  is  self-impart¬ 
ive. 

The  harvest  of  our  giving  is  this :  that  every  im¬ 
parting  of  ourselves  to  a  human  being,  growing  in 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


165 


him,  and  from  him  in  his  impartings  to  others,  and 
becoming  in  each  and  from  each  a  new  creation  of 
humanity,  is  continual  return  of  increased  human¬ 
ity  into  the  giver’s  heart.  In  this  giving  of  our¬ 
selves  we  create  the  human  in  which  we  live,  and 
with  whose  advance  we  advance  continually.  Yet 
this  creative  reciprocity  is  not  all.  The  mother  is 
born  again  in  the  child’s  birth,  before  its  second 
birth  from  her  to  be  a  responsive  soul.  The  per¬ 
fecting  of  Jesus  by  his  suffering  did  not  wait  for 
the  faith  of  even  one  disciple.  The  giving  is  itself 
attainment  of  self-imparting  humanity,  even 
though  not  one  man  should  hold  out  receptive 
hands.  Yet  love  will  not  thus  be  satisfied,  but  is 
insistent  to  be  received  by  every  soul. 

This  interpretation  of  humanity  is  a  postulate  to 
be  tested  by  its  outworkings,  which  are  humanity’s 
self-developments.  But  this  supreme  of  human 
claims  differs  from  other  postulates  in  this  respect, 
that  it  must  not  doubt  nor  falter  in  its  self-affirma¬ 
tion.  And  it  differs  in  this  respect  also,  that  its 
self-affirmation  is  self-realization,  with  immediate 
and  increasing  consciousness  of  worth  and  joy. 

In  still  another  respect,  the  assumption  that  hu¬ 
manity  is  essentially  impartive  love  differs  from 
lower  postulates.  Its  truth  is  judged  by  the  en¬ 
largement  of  inner  experience,  one’s  own  and  hu¬ 
manity’s.  No  accident  or  calamity  can  invalidate 
its  experience  of  success,  no  extreme  of  pain  and 
shame,  no  cross  and  tomb.  It  is  indeed  confident 
of  subduing  all  things  to  itself ;  but  that  assurance 
is  founded  upon  its  own  inner  self-realization,  not 


166  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

upon  any  experience  of  external  things.  Realizing 
itself,  it  is  conqueror:  subduing  all  things  to  itself, 
it  is  more  than  conqueror.  If  all  the  human  that 
a  physical  omnipotence  could  reach  were  tortured, 
outraged,  destroyed,  this  would  be  no  proof  of  in¬ 
sufficiency,  no  argument  against  success  final  and 
complete.  The  human,  in  this  self-realization,  can 
not  therefore  vindicate  itself  by  citing  any  adven¬ 
titious  gain  in  earth  or  heaven.  It  can  only  pro¬ 
claim  itself  as  gospel,  summoning  men  to  this  find¬ 
ing  of  themselves,  as  participants  in  the  realization 
of  humanity.  When  the  human  thus  proclaims 
itself  as  impartive  love,  it  is  a  resurrection  trumpet 
to  the  slumbering  life  of  souls  that  are  not  alto¬ 
gether  dehumanized. 

§2 

For  the  practical  realization  of  the  impartive 
love-life  in  the  world  of  men,  which  seems  so  hostile 
to  it,  which  supremely  needs  it,  the  following  re¬ 
flections  may  be  of  service.  Some  are  repeated 
from  the  last  chapter,  but  with  this  higher  point  of 
view.  Some  of  them  may  seem,  at  first  thought,  to 
fall  short  of  love’s  demands,  which  preserves  its 
noblest  nature  in  its  lowliest  ministries,  conceding 
to  nothing  else,  accepting  nothing  else  except  to 
transform  it.  But  our  reflections  will,  I  trust,  not 
only  lead  to  the  heights,  but  there  will  be  found  im¬ 
plicit  in  them  all  nothing  less  than  love’s  very  self. 

The  dispute  between  egoist  and  altruist  has 
failed  to  take  sufficient  account  of  humanity.  Every 
man  has  part  in  the  life  of  humanity,  which  is  in- 


1M PARTI VE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


167 


creased  by  the  giving  of  oneself,  and  this  participa¬ 
tion  is  his  own  self-fulfillment. 

Reactions  of  one’s  own  personal  worth  against 
the  individual  altruist,  the  indignant  affirmations 
of  one’s  own  life  to  be  lived,  and  one’s  own  task  to 
be  achieved,  are  justified.  We  may  repudiate  his 
less  than  social  interpretations  of  such  words  as 
service,  unselfishness,  sacrifice.  When  sacrificial 
men  say  that  they  have  never  made  a  sacrifice,  they 
affirm  that  every  outpouring  of  themselves  has  been 
their  own  life’s  consummate  gain.  How  can  I  as¬ 
sert  the  supreme  worth  of  every  man  when  I  deny 
it  of  myself!  Criticisms  directed  against  Jesus, 
because  he  offered  as  well  as  demanded,  have  not 
learned  what  humanity  was  to  his  soul. 

If  any  giving  of  oneself  is  not  an  enrichment  both 
of  humanity  and  one’s  own  soul,  then  there  is  with¬ 
holding,  not  a  real  giving.  A  woman  may  not  re¬ 
nounce  her  womanhood,  either  outside  of  marriage 
or  within  marriage,  which  should  be  the  pure  and 
exquisite  yieldings  and  attainings  of  womanhood. 
If  she  degrades  herself,  she  impoverishes  herself, 
the  devastator,  and  humanity’s  interblended  life. 
There  must  not  be,  in  any  human  relation,  a  gift 
which  is  the  surrender  of  character,  the  impover¬ 
ishment  of  personal  life.  No  person,  least  of  all  a 
child  in  its  helplessness,  must  be  required  or  per¬ 
mitted  to  give  up  to  any  industrial  order — or  dis¬ 
order — the  development  of  those  faculties  whose 
neglect  makes  him  a  cog  in  a  worthless  machine. 
No  despotism,  whether  insolent,  or  insidious  under 
the  fair  titles  of  democracy,  may  require  of  any 


168  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


citizen  the  sacrifice  to  itself  of  that  which  should 
be  rendered  to  personal  social  ends. 

Essential  to  the  value  of  any  man’s  offering  of 
himself  is  his  own  discovery  of  just  that  which ‘he 
is  for  humanity.  The  artist,  the  poet,  the  thinker, 
cannot  deny  those  claims  of  their  genius,  in  which 
is  their  supreme  potency  of  giving.  This  admoni¬ 
tion  is  for  those  who  possess  these  gifts,  not  for 
those  who  mistake  a  taste  for  expressive  power. 
There  must  be  the  same  regard  for  less  distin¬ 
guished  abilities  in  common  men.  All  choices  be¬ 
tween  devoted  ministries  should  be  one’s  own  and 
not  another’s.  Humanity  has  formed  in  each  man 
a  unique  potency,  which  others  may  indicate  or 
awake,  but  only  he  discover.  How  limited  a  scope 
for  these  free  choices  is  offered  in  present  social 
conditions! 

None  the  less,  the  one  test  of  a  man’s  personal 
fulfillment  is  the  world’s  need  of  him.  The  at¬ 
tempted  development  of  powers  except  for  the 
world’s  need  is  the  constriction  of  the  soul,  in  the 
selfishness  which  is  inaccessible  to  the  wealth  of 
humanity.  In  some  cases  this  impulse  may  be  un¬ 
conscious.  Though  the  golden  voice  cannot  help 
singing,  its  deepest  joy  of  song  is  that  it  may  make 
music  for  the  world.  The  world’s  need  is  impera¬ 
tive,  even  when  it  requires  a  man  to  fling  what  he 
is  or  might  become  into  the  ground  to  die,  and  to 
bear  much  fruit  by  dying,  or  when  there  is  allotted 
to  rare  genius 

“A  corner  of  some  foreign  field, 

To  be  forever  England,” 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


169 


or  when  the  body  of  the  crucified  Christ  is  laid  in 
the  most  desolate  of  sepulchres.  A  man's  supreme 
determinative  is  the  world’s  need  of  him,  and  when 
he  gathers  and  spends  himself  for  that  need,  hu¬ 
manity  and  his  own  soul  reap  rich  fulfillments. 

The  very  self  must  be  given,  not  things  merely. 
Devotion  to  humanity  is  accomplished  not  through 
anything  external  to  a  man,  but  in  his  own  heart’s 
blood.  In  this  vital  meaning  the  saying  is  true, 
“We  are  saved  by  the  blood  of  Christ.”  Devotion 
is  nothing  less  than  the  pouring  forth  of  our  own 
souls.  Nothing  less  than  this  meets  the  world’s 
need.  It  is  life  of  which  the  world’s  veins  are  scant. 
The  consciousness  of  every  true  benefactor  is,  “I 
am  come  that  they  may  have  life,  and  that  they  may 
have  it  more  abundantly.”  The  giving  of  our  ex¬ 
ternal  things  is  the  pleasantest  of  pastimes,  unless 
a  man  is  so  unreasonable  as  to  expect  payment  in 
gratitude.  Let  him  transform  his  gift  by  filling  it 
with  his  impartive  soul.  Then  he  will  find  what  it 
costs  to  give,  and  what  gain  there  is  in  giving.  One 
who  gives  himself  is  pierced  through  with  many 
sorrows,  and  is  crowned  with  many  crowns. 

Yet  the  world’s  work,  in  which  we  all  have  part, 
is  for  most  men  the  giving  of  the  things  which  the 
world  requires.  Through  these  things  life  must  be 
given.  Every  ministry  of  things  must  be  made  the 
channel  of  soul  from  man  to  man,  unto  the  fulfill¬ 
ments  of  humanity’s  interblended  life.  It  is  this 
aim  which  must  estimate  and  direct  all  the  organ¬ 
izations  of  men’s  work.  The  way  is  long,  but  it  is 
the  only  way.  There  are  many  obstacles  and  ad- 


170  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

versaries,  but  to  overcome  them  is  just  the  human 
task. 

That  we  may  give,  it  is  necessary  to  receive.  The 
great  reservoir  must  gather  itself  continuously 
from  seeping  forests  and  mountain  streams,  from 
skies  and  oceans,  that  it  may  be  sufficient  to  water 
all  the  garden  of  humanity.  Amenities,  delights, 
raptures  are  yours,  in  high  application  of  the  prin¬ 
ciple,  that  the  right  to  property  is  the  social  use  of 
it.  The  passion  to  impart  creates  these  receptivi¬ 
ties.  Love  is  the  supreme  energy  for  increasing 
the  riches  of  one’s  own  soul.  In  the  proportion  of 
my  love  must  I  gain  the  wherewithal  to  give.  Even 
the  accumulation  of  the  mammon  of  unrighteous¬ 
ness  is  included.  Yours  are  the  holidays  when  you 
“loaf  and  invite  your  soul,”  that  you  may  have  soul 
to  impart.  You  must  have  joy,  to  radiate  the  joy¬ 
ousness  of  which  the  world  has  vast  need.  Many 
discriminations  are  required  here.  But  whatever 
the  appeals  for  renunciations,  it  is  still  true  that  to 
the  unselfish  soul  there  is  open  a  world  of  pleasant¬ 
ness,  engaging  interests,  happy  thoughts.  When 
exigencies  of  impartive  love  call  you  from  them, 
it  is  to  increase  them — not  always  indeed  immedi¬ 
ately — in  amazing  ways.  Yours  are  art  and  music 
and  all  manner  of  fascinating  lore  of  men  and  na¬ 
ture,  shared  with  congenial  friends  and  those  who 
are  closer  than  friends,  and  also  making  you  the 
source  of  refreshment  for  all  chance  acquaintances. 
The  consummate  symbol  of  this  realm  is  a  devoted 
woman’s  smile,  which  radiates  the  sweet  riches  of 
her  happy  soul.  Because  you  owe  the  immeasur- 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


171 


able  debt  to  all  men,  you  owe  nothing  to  the  exac¬ 
tions  of  “the  devastator  of  the  day,”  the  intruder, 
the  inflicter  of  frets  and  worries:  all-wise  love  re¬ 
sponds  to  these  demands  with  greater  and  fine* 
gifts.  It  is  love’s  wisdom,  not  custom  or  convention, 
except  as  they  smooth  the  ways,  that  decides  what 
you  shall  give,  and  how  it  shall  be  given. 

Your  deepest  joy  in  your  fair  domain  is  to  trans¬ 
form  all  into  abiding  riches  of  the  soul,  which  in¬ 
crease  as  they  are  imparted.  The  self-consuming 
indulgencies  and  flaunting  vulgarities,  which  are 
incapable  of  this  spiritual  transformation,  are  to 
you  deserts  littered  with  dead  men’s  bones.  Yours 
is  the  delight  of  creative  self-expression,  in  forms 
however  inconspicuous,  which  is  the  outpouring  of 
your  treasure.  Then  every  lovely  possession,  multi¬ 
plied  in  receptive  hearts,  returns  into  your  life  with 
amazing  developments  and  variations. 

Among  the  recipients  of  our  impartive  love,  we 
find  the  same  discriminations  as  those  which  ap¬ 
pear  among  the  men  to  whom  we  turn  our  receptive 
faith.  As  we  receive  in  different  measures  the  hu¬ 
manity  which  is  our  inclusive  need,  first  and  most 
in  relations  that  are  closer  than  friendship,  then 
from  friends,  among  whom  we  desire  to  include  all 
men  in  the  different  kinds  and  degrees  of  their  con¬ 
tributions  to  our  life,  and  even  from  enemies,  so 
do  we  give  in  various  ways  of  giving.  So  inter¬ 
related  are  the  receiving  and  the  giving  that  the 
impartings  of  ourselves  have  been  briefly  reviewed, 
by  implication,  in  the  preceding  chapter.  A  few  re¬ 
flections  may  be  emphasized  here. 


172  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

The  most  intimate  impartations  are  most  evi¬ 
dently  universal,  both  in  their  source  and  in  their 
purpose.  They  are  intensifyings  of  humanity’s  in- 
terblended  life.  The  mother  concentrates  all  her 
humanness,  both  that  which  she  has  received  and 
that  which  she  has  new-created  in  her  own  life,  to 
pour  into  the  child’s  heart.  The  completeness  of 
the  gift  lays  upon  the  child  the  obligation  to  be  the 
servant  and  imparter  of  her  service  to  humanity. 
Among  the  consummations  of  the  human  belongs 
the  undying  devotion  of  a  man  to  one  woman, 
which  lavishes  at  her  dear  feet  all  he  is  and  may 
ever  become,  and  her  exquisite  response  in  the  in¬ 
effable  unfoldings  of  loved  and  loving  womanhood; 
and  the  secret  of  the  most  intimate,  most  romantic 
love  of  man  and  woman  is  the  consciousness  of 
their  united  task.  Their  task  together  of  impartive 
love  to  all  men  constitutes  their  life  together.  Their 
eternal  life  together,  which  they  cannot  doubt,  is 
this  eternal  task  together.  The  social  passion  in¬ 
cludes  the  supreme  personal  passions,  demands 
them,  completes  them. 

In  friendship,  which  implicitly  contains  all  men, 
the  art  of  impartive  life  requires  us  to  be  modest, 
but  not  too  self-distrustful,  in  estimating  that 
which  we  have  to  impart.  Often  our  proffers  are 
declined  because  they  would  diminish  life.  We 
must  also  be  so  humble  concerning  our  skill  to  im¬ 
part,  that  we  shall  take  pains  to  develop  it.  There 
are  discriminations  of  occasions  and  methods,  ap¬ 
preciations  of  the  differences  in  men,  patience  to 
await  a  receptiveness  which  we  may  also  foster 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


173 


unobtrusively.  The  mother’s  ways  are  our  best 
guides.  It  is  better  to  withhold  a  gift  a  while  than 
to  risk  a  premature  offer.  It  is  better  to  impart 
gradually  than  to  confuse  and  bewilder  by  the  offer 
of  more  than  can  be  received.  Varied  tact  charac¬ 
terizes  the  noblest  benefactions.  We  cannot  love 
too  much,  but  we  can  urge  too  precipitately.  It  is 
better  to  be  grateful  that  our  small  gift  is  accepted 
than  to  be  resentful  that  a  larger  one  is  not  appre¬ 
ciated. 

The  art  of  impartive  living  recognizes  a  discrimi¬ 
nation  of  self-giving  at  the  lower  limit  of  human¬ 
ity.  “Give  not  that  which  is  holy  unto  the  dogs, 
neither  cast  ye  your  pearls  before  swine,  lest  they 
trample  them  under  their  feet  and  turn  again  and 
rend  you.”  It  is  worthy  of  note  that  Jesus  is  re¬ 
ported  to  have  used  two  words  for  dogs,  one  for 
the  masterless  scavenger  of  oriental  alleys,  and  the 
other  for  the  companion  of  man.  We  are  not 
warned  against  people  who  are  like  faithful,  lov¬ 
able  dogs.  The  contrast  in  this  saying  is  extreme, 
between  savage  brutishness  and  holy,  precious 
things.  It  is  to  such  injurious  defilers  that  the  ex¬ 
cellent  is  not  to  be  exposed.  But  many  things  may 
be  given  even  to  them.  It  is  to  be  remembered  also 
that  Jesus  warned  against  the  judgment  which  pro¬ 
nounces  a  man  to  be  wild  dog  or  swine,  and  that  his 
mission  was  to  change  human  brutishness  into 
manhood. 

Nothing  limits  love’s  self-imparting  except  the 
refusal  to  receive.  And  love  turns  back  only  when 
its  very  offer  arouses  the  extreme  of  brutishness. 


174  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

There  is  no  conflict  between  love  and  justice.  Jus¬ 
tice  is  love's  demand  that  nothing  shall  obstruct  its 
self-imparting.  In  this  demand  love  is  inexorable. 
In  this  light  moral  discriminations  and  the  condi¬ 
tions  of  attaining  good  are  most  severe.  There  is 
no  divine  justice  which  is  not  love’s  minister.  There 
is  no  human  justice  which  is  not  love’s  servant. 
There  is  no  righteousness,  no  holiness  in  heaven  or 
earth,  which  is  not  impartive  love.  There  is  no 
true  law  or  necessary  penalty  which  contains  an 
element  from  any  other  source.  All  that  has  been 
written  concerning  justice  must  be  restated  in 
terms  of  impartive  love.  All  attempts  at  justice 
must  be  reconstructed  by  impartive  love. 

All  that  love  can  do,  for  enemies,  for  friends,  for 
those  who  are  closer  than  friends,  and  from  the 
height  of  its  heroisms  to  the  depths  of  its  compas¬ 
sions,  is  included  in  Jesus’  supreme  law  of  life: 
'‘Whosoever  will  save  his  life  shall  lose  it ;  but  who¬ 
soever  shall  lose  his  life  for  my  sake  and  the  gos¬ 
pel’s,  the  same  shall  save  it.”  The  words  “for  my 
sake  and  the  gospel’s,”  whether  or  not  they  are  lit¬ 
erally  authentic,  indicate  at  least  an  essential  of 
Jesus’  thought  and  life.  To  him  the  losing  of  life 
must  be  for  the  supreme  purpose,  for  the  cause  he 
served.  As  we  view  the  complete  statement  in  the 
light  of  Jesus’  life,  of  which  it  is  the  supremely  au¬ 
thentic  expression,  the  evident  meaning  is  that  the 
loss  of  life  for  the  supreme  object  is  itself  the  sav¬ 
ing  of  life.  The  true  life  is  the  blessedness  and 
worth  of  the  love  that  ever  gives  itself.  That  which 
love  gives  is  love’s  only  possession.  Love  gives  only 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


175 


to  souls,  and  creatively  gives  its  own  love-life  to 
them,  to  be  its  very  own.  When  a  man  loses  his 
life  for  humanity's  interblended  life,  in  this  hu¬ 
manity  and  in  every  member  of  it  is  life  of  his  life, 
soul  of  his  soul. 

What  was  said  in  the  preceding  chapter  concern¬ 
ing  our  receptions  from  social  groups  has  antici¬ 
pated  the  recognition  of  our  devotions  to  them.  We 
give  to  an  individual  that  we  may  give  through  him 
to  men,  in  the  larger  interblendings  which  socially 
form  personalities.  Even  motherhood  becomes 
petty  if  it  does  not  labor  to  pour  into  the  child  the 
impartive  life  which  is  supreme  in  motherhood.  A 
wedded  love  that  is  not  dominated  by  the  conscious¬ 
ness  of  the  ministering  task  together,  descends  into 
the  conventional  relation.  No  power  of  the  life 
which  saves  itself  by  losing  itself  may  stop  at  any 
point,  beyond  which  there  are  human  beings  to  be 
served.  All  concentrations  of  self-giving  are  for 
the  humanity  still  beyond.  Loyalty  to  country  is 
loyalty  to  the  nations,  by  serving  whom  our  coun¬ 
try  fulfills  itself.  Thus  it  is  with  our  loyal  pride 
in  our  civilization,  our  race,  and  even  with  devo¬ 
tion  to  our  whole  world  of  men,  if  beyond  this  also 
there  are  human  beings  to  be  served.  From  every 
man  there  are  paths  to  every  man.  In  every  serv¬ 
ice  it  is  humanity  we  serve,  not  a  conceptual,  phan¬ 
tasmal  humanity,  but  the  interblended  life  which 
throbs  in  humanity's  every  vein.  Every  giving  is 
unto  the  developing  consummation  of  humanity: 
it  is  for  the  cause  we  serve. 


176  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


§3 

But  that  loving  faith  in  concrete  humanity, 
without  which  the  human  cannot  be  the  supreme 
object  of  devotion,  meets  a  concrete,  vital,  unspecu- 
lative  objection.  This  is  human  sin.  The  recogni¬ 
tion  of  its  significance  has  thus  far  in  our  journey 
been  only  foreshadowed.  The  postponement  of  its 
encounter  may  have  aroused  the  indignant  impa¬ 
tience  of  some  readers.  Such  protesters  need  not 
be  thought  of  as  cynics,  puritans  in  the  unlovely 
connotations  of  that  word,  or  traditionally  minded 
theologians.  Clear  vision  looks  upon  a  mankind  in¬ 
fected  with  revolting  hardness,  selfishness,  bestial¬ 
ity.  How  shall  that  devotion  to  humanity  which 
involves  faith  in  humanity  be  attained  across  the 
monstrous  gulf  of  human  sin? 

Liberal  religious  thought  has  paled  before  the 
great  evangelical  inheritance,  which  asserts  evil 
hearts  that  must  be  made  holy,  and  a  sinful  world 
that  must  be  redeemed.  Though  degrading  concep¬ 
tions  and  obscene  images — congenial  to  some  of  the 
new  psychologists — have  befouled  the  pages  and 
seared  the  lips  of  many  champions  of  this  evangel¬ 
ical  inheritance,  though  these  men  have  blasphemed 
both  pure  natural  loveliness  and  the  holy  motives 
of  many  exalted  souls,  though  they  have  indulged 
strange  dreams  of  everlasting  tortures,  physical 
and  mental,  as  inflicted  penalties,  and  have  done 
despite  to  the  compassionateness  of  Christ  and  the 
fatherhood  of  God,  still  this  tradition  makes  a 
mightier  appeal  than  any  that  is  won  by  ignorings, 
palliations,  or  extenuations  of  the  abhorrent  fact, 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


177 


the  desolating  infamy.  When  the  exaggerations 
and  distortions,  the  defamations  of  God  and  man, 
have  been  stripped  away,  then  the  proclamation  of 
human  sin  becomes  more  clear  and  overwhelming. 
When  these  perversions  are  entirely  absent,  the 
conviction  of  sin  is  most  penetrating  before  the 
holiness  of  Jesus,  and  his  fate  by  the  reeking  hands 
of  the  same  infernalities  which  run  riot  in  the 
world  today. 

The  humanist  can  least  of  all  men  neglect  the 
reality  of  sin.  All  his  seeking  begins  with  the  un¬ 
shrinking  envisagement  of  reality  in  the  hearts  of 
men  and  the  life  of  mankind.  Else  he  will  make 
little  progress  toward  the  heights  of  life,  crowned 
with  the  meaning  of  redemption,  and  the  presence 
of  the  holy  Christ  and  of  Christlike  souls. 

The  social  passion  can  least  of  all  devotions  neg¬ 
lect  the  reality  of  sin.  The  conviction  is  essential 
to  practical  ministries.  The  enthusiasm  for  social 
good  encounters  the  entrenchments  and  aggres¬ 
sions  of  social  wrong.  It  is  the  duty  of  the  confes¬ 
sor  of  the  social  passion  to  be  intimately  cognizant 
of  these  antagonists,  in  their  active  oppositions  and 
insensible  brutishness,  to  detect  slippery  men  and 
the  purblind  ease  and  smug  complacency  of  their 
respectable  confederates,  else  he  himself  becomes 
the  tool  of  treacheries.  Sanguine  people  of  benevo¬ 
lent  disposition  are  dupes  and  jest  of  all  the  hells. 
The  traditionally  inculcated  division  of  the  soul 
against  itself  must  be  to  him  a  deeper  disruption 
within  the  interblended  life  of  humanity,  and  there¬ 
fore  destructive  of  his  own  personal  being. 


178  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

What  is  sin,  that  it  may  be  fought  not  as  a  spec¬ 
ter  of  the  night,  but  in  life's  open  field?  This  is  not 
to  ask  how  it  came  to  be,  nor  how  it  is  thinkable 
that  sin  should  be. 

To  recognize  in  sin  the  inheritance  of  the  brute 
is  helpful,  for  our  warfare  is  of  the  human  against 
the  brutal.  Much  in  “the  new  psychology"  is  our 
ally,  since  it  drives  out  into  the  open  the  enemies 
that  lurk  in  the  secret  places  of  the  city  of  man- 
soul.  Only  we  must  summon  our  spiritual  powers 
to  arms  against  them.  But  to  take  the  inheritance 
of  the  brute  as  the  answer  to  the  question  of  what 
sin  is,  is  of  no  value  to  one  who  is  in  earnest  with 
moral  distinctions.  For  the  brute  does  not  sin,  in 
any  meaning  that  illumines  our  moral  warfare. 
We  do  not  inherit  that  which  is  not.  That  answer 
would  put  an  end  to  moral  distinctions,  and  so  to 
humanism,  which  we  have  accepted  because  we 
could  not  endure  to  live  in  any  other  way.  The 
answer  is  undiscriminating,  for  many  normal 
things  are  inherited  from  the  brute.  To  find  the 
distinction  between  the  normal  and  the  abnormal 
we  must  look  elsewhere.  By  our  moral  energies, 
our  spiritual  strivings,  the  inheritance  from  the 
brute  must  be  transcended  and  subdued.  In  failure 
of  that  the  humanist  recognizes  sin. 

It  has  indeed  been  helpful,  in  some  ways,  to  say 
that  sin  is  opposition  to  the  will  of  God,  or  to  a  law 
transcendent  of  man,  or  whatever  expresses  man's 
disobedience  to  something  superhuman.  For  such 
contritions  recognize  sin's  antagonism  to  the  high¬ 
est  and  best.  Every  evil  thing,  even  back  into  the 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


179 


inmost  recesses  of  thought  and  desire,  directs  its 
violence  against  that  which  abhors  it  most  deeply, 
feels  it  most  sensitively.  Yet,  in  order  that  this 
answer  may  have  a  practical  value,  it  is  necessary 
to  seek  what  that  holy  will  is,  and  where  it  is.  For 
men  have  lightly  inflicted  all  manner  of  inhumani¬ 
ties  upon  one  another,  while  dreading  as  guilt  in 
the  sight  of  God  unmoral  infractions  of  taboo,  rite, 
ceremonial,  demand  of  witch-doctor  or  ecclesiastic, 
rule  of  church,  or  authority  of  creed.  In  the  judg¬ 
ment  of  Jesus'  supremely  human  heart,  it  is  sin 
against  the  highest  and  holiest  to  cause  one  of  these 
little  ones  to  stumble,  to  betray  a  friend,  to  fare 
sumptuously  while  Lazarus  is  laid  at  the  gate,  full 
of  sores,  to  leave  the  naked  unclothed,  the  stranger 
unwelcomed,  the  sick  uncared  for,  the  prisoner  un¬ 
visited,  to  shut  oneself  away  from  men’s  joys  and 
sufferings,  to  seek  to  save  one’s  life  except  by  los¬ 
ing  it. 

The  humanist  looks  for  the  answer  to  the  ques¬ 
tion  of  what  sin  is,  not  beneath  the  life  of  man  nor 
above  it.  To  him  sin  is  the  unhuman  in  man’s  life 
arrayed  against  the  human.  It  is  beyond  the  scope 
of  my  unpretentious  task  to  discuss  and  refute  all 
other  ethical  theories,  and  to  establish  this  convic¬ 
tion  on  the  ruins  of  the  others.  My  attempt  is  to 
describe  what  the  human  is,  in  the  faith  and  love 
of  the  social  passion,  and  to  disclose  its  opposite. 
Sin  is  to  the  confessor  of  that  passion  the  unhuman 
against  the  human  in  the  life  of  men,  but  destruct¬ 
ive  of  their  real  life.  Sin  is  inhumanity. 

This  conviction  of  sin  as  inhumanity  must  be 


180  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

held  by  the  humanist  as  a  postulate  to  be  tested. 
The  test  is  this:  to  see  whether  our  fight  against 
sin  as  antihuman  is  not  essential  to  the  develop¬ 
ment  of  humanity.  The  postulate  is  worth  testing 
because  the  battle  is  worth  fighting.  It  distin¬ 
guishes  between  friend  and  foe,  with  many  start¬ 
ling  recognitions  of  friends  and  foes.  It  opens  be¬ 
fore  us  the  field  of  a  real  conflict,  with  effective 
armament  and  strategy.  It  pours  into  our  awak¬ 
ened  hearts  the  sanctifying  spirit  of  indignant 
compassion  and  sacrificial  love.  And  if  it  is  neces¬ 
sary,  as  humanists  believe,  to  live  in  the  life  of 
one’s  own  time,  when  the  time  is  characterized  by 
the  passion  that  burns  in  the  hearts  whom  human¬ 
ity  has  touched,  then  it  is  against  the  inhuman  and 
for  humanity  that  we  must  array  ourselves,  in 
these  days  when  the  thunders  of  Sinai  are  less  loud 
than  the  moan  of  one  hungry  child. 

The  supreme  spiritual  worth  is  the  human,  that 
concrete  interblended  life  which  is  named  human¬ 
ity.  We  receive  ourselves  from  this  as  from  the 
opposite  of  every  inhuman  intrusion.  Essential  to 
this  reception,  as  we  have  seen,  is  the  beating  back, 
as  alien  to  us,  of  everything  that  cannot  become  a 
constituent  of  our  truly  human  life.  The  real  hu¬ 
manity  forms  each  man’s  true  life.  Sin,  as  con¬ 
trary  to  the  human,  diminishes,  represses,  perverts, 
destroys  the  human  which  we  must  become  from 
more  to  more.  Each  man’s  still  deeper  winning  of 
himself,  by  losing  himself,  is  by  his  pouring  forth 
of  the  human  into  the  human,  and  against  the  un¬ 
human  which  assails  it.  Humanity,  the  concrete 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


181 


personal  social  interblended  life  of  men  is  holy. 
Holiness  is  the  very  being  of  its  receptive  faith  and 
impartive  love.  The  social  passion  is  a  militant 
holiness,  and  holy  is  the  cause  we  serve,  which  is 
the  fulfilling  and  perfecting  of  humanity. 

§4 

This  militant  holiness  which  is  humanity  goes 
forth  conquering  and  to  conquer,  with  a  greater 
power  than  the  progress  of  our  thought  has  yet 
recognized.  That  power  is  forgiveness,  to  speak 
its  less  expressive  name.  Humanity  without  for¬ 
giveness  would  be  less  than  a  little  company  of 
exclusive  spirits,  with  a  pitifully  impoverished  life. 
It  could  not  have  any  membership  at  all.  For 
neither  the  receptive  faith  nor  the  impartive  love, 
which  constitute  together  the  creative  progress  of 
human  life,  could  exist  without  forgiveness.  This 
is  not  only  because  actual  forgivings  are  often 
necessary,  but  because  no  soul  can  receive  or  im¬ 
part  unless  it  stands  ever  ready  to  forgive.  What 
aTvain  imagination  would  be  mother-love  unwilling 
to  forgive  everything  in  the  child  to  whom  it  gives 
itself!  Unto  the  emptying,  nullifying  of  humanity 
tends  every  unforgiving  sentiment,  every  Pharisa¬ 
ical  separateness,  every  dislike  and  indifference, 
every  consent  to  the  loss  from  humanity  of  even  the 
most  perverted  soul.  The  impartive  love  which 
saves  itself  by  losing  itself  is  in  its  inmost  being 
forgiving  love. 

The  literal  meaning  of  the  word  forgiveness  con¬ 
notes  remission  of  penalty  for  ill-desert.  This  is 


182  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

true  of  the  corresponding  word  in  the  language  of 
the  New  Testament,  and  in  many  languages.  But 
as  a  rule,  with  perhaps  no  exceptions,  the  original 
and  literal  meanings  of  sacred  words  present  crude 
conceptions,  which  are  transcended  by  spiritual 
developments.  It  is  so,  to  cite  familiar  instances, 
with  the  words  God,  Christ,  spirit,  heaven,  holiness. 
Who  would  seek  in  the  original  meanings  of  these 
words  the  satisfactions  of  the  soul!  One  might 
prefer  to  use  instead  of  forgiveness,  the  reflective 
word  reconciliation.  But  it  is  nearly  always  better 
to  fill  the  familiar  word  with  the  finer  meaning. 

Forgiveness,  as  Jesus  described  it,  is  the  restora¬ 
tion  of  a  fellowship  which  has  been  violated.  You 
forgive  the  man  who  has  sinned  against  you,  when 
you  take  him  back  into  the  relation  from  which  he 
has  separated  himself.  While  this  supreme  grace 
of  love  is  felt  most  poignantly  in  the  taking  back 
of  one  who  has  been  closest,  yet  it  extends  to  every 
sinful  man.  Because  of  the  interblending  of  human 
lives,  every  offence  is  against  every  man,  and  in 
every  forgiveness  all  men  have  implicit  part.  The 
heart  of  humanity  is  wounded  in  every  wrong¬ 
doing,  is  healed  in  every  forgiveness.  Though  the 
lost  soul  has  separated  himself  from  you  and  from 
humanity,  though  with  virulent  hate  he  outrages 
you  and  every  human  joy  and  grace,  and  strives  to 
thwart  the  growth  and  to  destroy  the  being  of  your 
life  and  the  interblended  life  of  men,  still  your 
heart  is  ever  ready  to  welcome  his  return.  “This 
my  son  was  dead,  and  is  alive  again;  he  was  lost, 
and  is  found.”  But  what  if  he  will  not  return? 


IMPARTIVE  LOVE  OF  SOCIAL  PASSION 


183 


What  if  there  be  no  receptive  faith  for  the  supreme 
outpouring  of  impartive  love? 

Then  forgiveness  fulfills  and  energizes  itself  in 
redemption.  This  is  the  greater  word,  its  meaning 
also  transcending  the  original  conception.  Among 
the  mountains  the  shepherd  seeks  the  lost  sheep. 
Redemptive  forgiveness  pursues  through  agony 
and  bloody  sweat,  through  cross  and  passion.  It 
descends  the  depths  of  hell.  Nor  will  its  energies 
ever  be  relaxed,  until  there  shall  not  be  one  soul 
lost  to  humanity  in  the  outer  darkness,  nor  until 
each  restoration  is  complete,  and  every  soul  in  full 
measure  receives  by  faith  and  pours  out  in  love  in¬ 
creasing  spiritual  wealth,  for  the  eternal  unfold¬ 
ings  of  humanity.  By  redemptive  forgiveness  is 
perfected  the  cause  we  serve. 


IX 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 

Say  not  the  stars  are  vast — nor  vast  their  spaces, 
Nor  eons  vast ,  through  ivhich  new  worlds  unroll; 
Masses  of  things  and  times  this  thought  effaces : 
The  Vast  is  thine  illimitable  Soul. 

HUS  far  we  have  tried  to  limit  our  appreci¬ 


ations  of  humanity  to  the  disclosures  of 


itself  in  this  world,  and  on  this  side  of 
death.  Yet  its  prophesies,  implications,  seemed 
ever  to  be  of  something  greater.  It  is  not  permis¬ 
sible  for  the  humanist  to  draw  an  argument  for 
these  extensions  from  anything  that  is  not  human. 
Does  the  human  itself  involve  them?  What  is  the 
scope  of  humanity’s  spiritual  universe? 


§1 


Two  doctrines  of  death  express  the  expectations 
prevalent  among  men  who  rate  themselves  as  civil¬ 
ized.  One  is,  that  death  is  finality.  “There  is  no 
work,  nor  device,  nor  knowledge,  nor  wisdom,  in 
the  grave,  whither  thou  goest.”  The  other,  so  far 
as  it  is  a  hope,  and  not  a  dread,  is  that  death  is  a 
transference  into  that  heaven  where  faith  is  ex¬ 
changed  for  sight,  conflict  for  victory,  effort  for 
rest,  sacrifice  for  an  unsacrificial  happiness  eternal. 
Faith  in  a  superhuman  God,  able  to  transfer  us,  is 
deemed  necessary  for  this  hope.  The  best  element 
in  these  two  doctrines  may  be  found  to  be  the  re- 


184 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


185 


pugnance  of  each  for  the  other,  the  ground  of 
which  in  both  is  the  dim  consciousness  of  a  faith 
missed  by  each  equally.  Each  suggests  a  failure  to 
estimate  life's  supreme  quality. 

The  chief  goods  of  the  brighter  of  these  two  ex¬ 
pectations  are  not  faith,  conflict,  sacrifice,  but  their 
opposites,  conceived  as  rewards  for  ennoblements 
which  are  to  be  discarded.  Holiness  and  love  are 
indeed  promised,  but  as  gifts  conferred,  and  thus 
devoid  of  character  achieved  and  progressing. 
Though  there  are  often  mingled  with  this  hope 
finer  elements  derived  from  a  purer  source  of  con¬ 
viction,  yet  that  other  is  essentially  different. 
Even  when  the  traditional  hope  emphasizes  the 
vision  and  worship  of  God,  or  rises  into  mysti¬ 
cism’s  dizziest  heights,  vision  and  worship  are  sep¬ 
arated  from  the  essential  serviceableness  of  the  life 
taught  by  Jesus.  The  religion  of  Jesus,  in  this 
hope,  ceases  at  the  gate  of  heaven.  The  Crucified 
becomes  at  length  our  leader  into  the  opposite  of 
that  which  we  love  him  for,  and  of  that  which  we 
trust  him  to  enable  us  to  achieve.  This  conception 
of  the  future  life  loses  all  real  content,  save  as  it 
borrows  reality  from  a  faith  based  very  differently. 
Therefore  it  expatiates  in  golden  streets  and  robes 
and  crowns  and  thrones,  having  no  better  materials 
for  the  construction  of  its  dreams. 

This  hope  of  heaven  is  founded  upon  our  disil¬ 
lusions.  We  long  for  that  which  we  never  attain  in 
this  world,  or  attaining  lose,  and  so  we  dream  of 
fruitions  under  fairer  skies.  But  heaven  may  be 
another  cheat.  We  long  for  surcease  of  pain,  sor- 


186  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

row,  disappointment,  and,  having  to  endure  them 
while  life  lasts,  we  seek  comfort  in  the  thought  that 
at  death  these  burdens  will  be  rolled  away.  Above 
all,  our  weariness  longs  for  rest. 

The  disillusion  that  conceives  a  remote  hope  be¬ 
longs  to  a  small  and  ignoble  part  of  life,  and  is 
alien  to  life’s  manlier  joys  and  victories.  Its  foun¬ 
dation  is  as  insecure  as  are  other  disappointments 
of  happiness.  Even  if  we  base  this  faith  upon  a 
good  God  whose  pity  will  offer  us  relief  at  last, 
such  a  faith  in  God  is  itself  founded  upon  the  same 
ungratified  desires.  It  is  significant  that  this 
faith  easily  lapses  into  its  apparent  opposite,^  the 
expectation  of  the  finality  of  death.  For  we  cannot 
gain  assurance  that  what  we  vainly  long  for  here 
shall  be  given  us  elsewhere,  or  that  the  gift  could 
satisfy  us,  or  become  aught  else  than  a  burden  in¬ 
tolerable  in  its  eternity.  Our  expectation  is  beset 
with  fears  on  either  hand,  fears  that  it  may  be 
false,  and  fears  lest  it  may  be  true.  Therefore  the 
hope  tends  to  contract  itself  into  the  longing  of  our 
weariness  for  nothing  else  than  rest,  which  any 
consciousness  would  render  incomplete. 

The  rejection  of  this  hope  on  ethical  and  spir¬ 
itual  grounds  is  not  inconsistent  with  sympathy  for 
it  as  the  dream  of  the  oppressed,  as  it  was  the  con¬ 
solation  of  America’s  Negro  slaves,  whose  wonder¬ 
ful  spiritual  songs  are  full  of  it.  One  cannot  refuse 
the  relief  of  opium  to  intolerable  pain,  though  the 
medicine  has  no  curative  value,  and  is  pernicious 
save  for  exceptional  need.  Nor  does  the  failure  of 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


187 


a  positive  worth  in  the  traditional  anticipation 
deny  a  relative  usefulness.  It  is  better  to  dream 
of  such  a  heaven  than  to  sink  into  sensuality,  the 
alternative  recourse  for  a  life  of  sordid  helpless¬ 
ness;  though  often  both  reliefs  are  used  by  the 
same  pitiful  person.  Yet  even  so,  to  recognize 
something  above  the  sensual  may  be  the  first  step 
toward  the  spiritual.  This  hope  of  heaven  is  at 
any  rate  a  hope,  and  hope  is  better  than  despair  or 
insensibility.  And  “if  we  hope  for  that  we  see  not, 
then  do  we  with  patience  wait  for  it” ;  and  patience 
is  the  inalienable' virtue  of  the  helpless.  The  condi- 
tions  prescribed  for  the  realization  of  this  hope  are 
partly  ethical,  though  generally  accompanied  by 
superstitions  and  moral  deadenings,  imposed  by  an 
ecclesiasticism  whose  most  potent  weapons  are 
this  hope  of  heaven,  and  its  obverse,  the  dread  of 
hell;  arid  the  ethical  conditions  are  impaired  by 
the  unethical  motive  of  external  reward.  It  would 
be  a  desperate  world  if  the  great  host  of  the  very 
poor,  the  war-stricken,  the  outraged,  were  limited 
to  this  hope. 

But  even  halting  apologies  for  that  traditional 
view  of  the  hereafter  collapse,  whenever  a  man 
finds  a  real  life  to  live  in  the  world,  and  in  the  de¬ 
velopment  of  his  own  soul  and  the  soul  of  human¬ 
ity.  Then  it  is  no  longer  possible  to  wait  for  a 
heaven  that  is  to  be  given,  in  a  waiting  which  ac¬ 
complishes  nothing  radical  for  the  improvement 
of  human  conditions,  nor  for  the  development  of 
life  itself,  one’s  own  life  in  and  for  humanity’s  life. 
The  faith  based  upon  fond  longings  is  recognized 


188  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


by  thoughtful  earnestness  to  be  hostile  to  progress, 
supine  before  evil.  It  is  no  ground  of  censure  that 
popular  movements  of  social  reform,  whatever 
their  other  excellencies  or  defects,  often  repudiate 
this  hope  of  heaven  and  the  God  of  this  hope,  as 
opposed  to  that  which  is  right  and  useful  in  their 
cause.  If  the  hope  is  still  held  traditionally,  as  a 
creed,  it  is  distinct  from  militant  manhood,  and  its 
fading  out  is  so  inevitable  as  to  be  often  uncon¬ 
scious. 

The  denial  of  a  future  life  has  various  causes. 
It  may  be  the  conclusion  to  which  many  intellectual 
men  have  felt  themselves  forced:  that  the  relation 
of  the  physical  and  the  mental — roughly  termed 
body  and  soul — is  such  that  the  dissolution  of  the 
former  marks  the  cessation  of  the  latter.  Yet 
when  the  case  seemed  most  desperate  for  soul,  the 
terrifying  facts  could  not  quite  pronounce  our 
doom.  There  still  remained  the  possibility  of  some 
continuing  spiritual  potency  beyond  the  cognizance 
of  physical  science.  But  we  are  not  driven  from 
investigation  and  thought  into  the  merely  possible 
inconceivable.  Recent  closer  investigation  of  facts, 
with  more  careful  estimates  of  them,  leaves  the 
question  open  from  the  physical  point  of  view.* 
The  physical  is  indeed  incompetent  to  bear  witness 
to  the  spiritual.  The  established  physical  facts  of 
the  connection  between  body  and  soul  leave  no 
physical  element  in  the  hope  of  the  hereafter.  If 
any  insist  upon  constraining  thought  and  life 

♦For  a  positive  construction  of  the  relation  of  body  and  soul  the 
reader  is  referred  to  Bergson,  especially  to  his  recent  book  of  col¬ 
lected  essays. 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


189 


within  the  limits  of  the  physical,  the  question  of  the 
future  life  is  excluded,  with  all  that  makes  life 
valuable.  But  to  all  others,  there  is  no  known 
physical  fact  that  closes  the  discussion ;  nor,  so  long 
as  any  spiritual  experiences  remain,  can  there  be. 
Yet  all  the  physical  facts  drive  us  into  the  inmost 
heart  of  the  spiritual  life,  to  achieve  our  answers 
there. 

The  surrender  of  immortality  may  have  grounds 
debased  or  excellent.  The  brute  knows  nothing 
above  the  brutal.  And  though  the  brute  may  speak 
with  man’s  voice,  and  think  in  human  categories, 
and  though  he  may  imagine  his  brutal  gratifica¬ 
tions  extended  through  eternity,  yet  his  implicit 
consciousness  is  that  the  end  of  the  flesh  is  the  end 
of  all.  No  answer  is  due  to  his  blasphemy  of  the 
human,  except  the  answer  of  men  who  by  faithful¬ 
ness  unto  death  have  silenced  such  blasphemies. 

In  the  denial  which  has  nobler  motives,  great 
affirmations  are  implicit.  It  is  the  rejection  of  a 
longing  which  has  no  basis  of  assurance,  and  which 
is  beneath  what  any  true  man  can  desire,  and  which 
weakens  life  in  this  world.  In  a  justified  repulsion 
from  the  traditional  hope  of  heaven,  in  the  dis¬ 
claiming  of  reward  for  toil  and  sacrifice,  when  the 
reward,  both  as  reward  and  in  its  contents,  offers 
a  thing  infinitely  inferior  to  toil  and  sacrifice,  a 
rapidly  increasing  number  of  servants  of  humanity 
live  without  hope  of  the  hereafter,  that  they  may 
live  more  abundantly  and  serviceably  in  the  world. 
They  are  beyond  the  reach  of  the  traditional  argu¬ 
ments,  because  they  are  so  absorbed  in  the  present 


190  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

world  of  present  service  as  to  have  no  practical 
concern  for  any  other  world.  For  them  the  values 
of  the  present  life  are  continually  intensified  and 
deepened.  And  these  values  contain  two  great 
faiths  in  one:  the  first,  that  their  life  is  above  ma¬ 
terial  things ;  and  the  second,  that  the  ends  of  their 
toil  and  conflict  are  permanent. 

The  finality  of  death  is  the  denial  of  that  which 
such  men  hold  dear,  when  they  attain  a  clear  con¬ 
sciousness  of  devoted  and  achieving  life.  There 
is  indeed  greatness  of  soul  in  working  without  hope 
of  reward  here  or  hereafter.  But  this  self-abnega¬ 
tion  cannot  involve  the  destruction  of  the  cause  it 
serves.  Though  every  unselfish  soul  might  say: 
“Let  me  perish,  if  only  that  for  which  I  die  con¬ 
tinues  to  bless  other  men;  let  me  die  utterly  that 
humanity  may  live/'  yet  those  whom  they  serve 
to  the  uttermost  would  lose,  in  the  annihilation  of 
these  servants,  an  indispensable  good;  and  those 
to  whom  they  sacrifice  themselves  are  involved  in 
their  fate.  If  their  doom  be  extinction,  then,  though 
the  redemption  which  they  wrought  should  for  ages 
bring  forth  and  expand  every  mortal  good,  even 
beyond  the  visions  of  the  “Prometheus  Unbound,” 
yet  the  countless  billions  of  men  whom  they  have 
made  happy  would,  with  their  benefactors,  and  with 
those  whom  they  themselves  benefit,  drop  into  noth¬ 
ingness  ;  until  finally,  throughout  the  lifeless  earth, 
all  the  harvests  of  the  ages  grown  upon  their 
graves  would  be  as  if  they  had  never  been.  If  one 
rejoins,  “Yet  these  goods  are  good  while  they  last,” 
let  him  transfer  that  thought  to  the  time  when  they 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


191 


all  have  passed,  and  attempt  to  find  any  meaning 
in  that  judgment.  How  true  is  an  assertion  which 
is  true  only  for  an  hour? 

There  is  then  an  eternal  hope  worthy  of  human¬ 
ity.  It  is  the  hope  of  the  development  of  the  spirit¬ 
ual  social  life  of  receptive  faith,  impartial  love, 
limitless  redemption,  unto  the  cause  we  serve.  Far 
from  diminishing  our  present  service,  it  pours 
into  its  inexhaustible  energies.  This  hope  is  purest 
and  strongest  when  we  cherish  it  for  humanity's 
eternal  life.  And  in  the  hope  for  humanity  is  con¬ 
tained  the  hope  for  each  human  soul. 

In  the  chapters  upon  The  Receptive  Faith  and 
Impartive  Love  of  the  Social  Passion,  we  have  felt, 
I  trust,  that  humanity  is  the  essential  of  every  per¬ 
sonality,  and  that  every  personality  is  needed  by 
humanity;  and  that  this  essential  reciprocal  need 
develops  itself  continually.  Just  this  reference  is 
sufficient,  I  trust,  to  make  clear  that  our  hope  for 
humanity  as  the  interblended  life  of  men  is  hope 
for  every  soul  in  that  interblended  life. 

It  is  not  permissible  for  humanism — may  I  re¬ 
peat?  — to  attempt  to  draw  from  outside  of  human¬ 
ity  any  proofs  for  the  immortality  of  the  soul.  Im¬ 
mortality  cannot  be  assured  to  us  by  a  superhuman 
decree.  The  spiritual  life,  in  every  phase  of  its 
development,  is  a  self-development.  Its  immortal 
continuance  is  ever  to  be  achieved  by  every  soul 
and  by  the  humanity  to  which  every  soul  contri¬ 
butes. 

Our  eternal  hope  cannot  limit  itself  to  the  im¬ 
mortality  of  a  remnant  of  humanity,  the  spiritually 


192  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

minded.  Whether  any  soul  may  make  humanity 
poorer  by  its  own  individual  extinction,  failing 
in  the  battle  for  eternal  life  which  each  and  all  must 
wage,  can  be  decided  only  by  the  progressive  issues 
of  the  conflict  for  the  cause  we  serve.  Such  catas- 
trophies  will  not  be  if  humanity's  mighty  forces  of 
forgiveness  and  redemption  can  avert  them.  This 
hope  of  the  hereafter  contemplates  the  eternal  salva¬ 
tion  of  every  soul,  its  holiness  in  humanity's  essen¬ 
tial  holiness,  its  reception  by  faith  of  all  that 
humanity  can  give,  its  self-attainment  by  the  per¬ 
fecting  of  impartive  love.  What  patient  energies  of 
forgiveness  and  redemption  must  humanity  expend, 
to  win  to  itself  the  souls  that  are  all  but  unhuman 
or  dehumanized! 

The  only  way  to  strengthen  the  eternal  hope 
which  has  worth  is  by  practical,  serviceable  living. 
This  alone  leads  deeper  into  the  life  where  this  hope 
is.  The  opposite  of  other-worldliness  confirms  our 
faith  in  that  larger  life.  One  may  indeed  be  so  ab¬ 
sorbed  in  life's  task  as  to  seem  to  lose  this  signi¬ 
ficance  of  life's  task.  Yet  through  it  all,  the  con¬ 
sciousness  of  its  eternity  is  forming.  There  are  in¬ 
deed  reposeful,  reflective  hours.  But  their  purpose 
is  not  to  draw  us  away  from  our  work,  but  to  clarify 
and  deepen  it,  until  its  eternal  significance  is  clear. 
Not  by  any  isolation  from  our  fellows  can  this 
hope  be  confirmed,  not  by  any  retirement  from  the 
work  of  life,  in  which  alone  we  are  really  one  with 
them.  Isolation  is  eternal  death.  Most  efficient 
aids  to  this  faith  are  co-operative  friendships,  and 
blendings  of  life  deeper  than  friendships,  if  these 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


193 


are  granted  us,  in  a  task  together  more  intimate 
than  even  friendship  knows,  with  souls  most  un¬ 
selfishly,  serviceably,  consummately  human,  whom 
to  know  is  eternal  life. 

If  it  is  asked  whether  the  eternal  life  is  believed 
or  known,  is  faith  or  certainty,  some  simplifications 
of  humanistic  thought  may  clarify  this  aspect  of  the 
relation  of  faith  and  knowledge.  To  know  is  to  ex¬ 
perience.  Processes  of  thought  have  value  by  their 
service  to  experience,  as  they  test  and  clarify  and 
distinguish  and  unify  our  experiences,  which  make 
our  life.  What  is  logically  demonstrated  is  not 
possessed  by  us  until  life  makes  use  of  it.  If  we  do 
not  find  the  life  eternal  in  life’s  unfoldings,  we  do 
not  find  it  anywhere.  We  must  find  the  life  which 
is  above  the  physical,  and  whose  development  can¬ 
not  admit  a  limit  without  denying  the  very  essential 
of  that  growing  life.  This  is  the  life  which  each 
person  may  live  in  the  interblended  life  of  human¬ 
ity,  the  life  of  receptive  faith  and  impartive  love 
and  essential  holiness  and  unbounded  redemption. 
The  eternal  life  is  the  supreme  social  consciousness. 
This  experience  of  the  personal  social  life  as  above 
the  physical  and  of  limitless  unfolding,  is  to  be 
lived  into,  fought  for.  The  formal  distinction  be¬ 
tween  faith  and  knowledge  is  replaced  by  the  de¬ 
velopment  of  experience.  We  take  the  eternal  hope 
into  our  lives,  devoted  to  the  cause  we  serve,  and 
test  it  there,  whether  it  gives  life  more  abundantly. 
We  find  it  strengthening  and  deepening  life,  be¬ 
coming  pervasive  and  essential  in  all  that  furthers 
the  cause  we  serve.  This  certitude  is  never  abso- 


194  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

lute  in  the  sense  that,  having  gained  it,  we  can 
leave  it  as  a  problem  solved  and  turn  to  other  in¬ 
terests.  It  becomes  more  and  more  life  of  our  life, 
soul  of  our  soul,  in  serviceable  interblendings  with 
the  humanity  in  which  our  personality  is  fulfilled. 
Those  who  have  risen  above  doubt  are  those  who 
have  refused  to  receive  this  conviction  too  easily, 
until  their  life  task  has  become  flooded  with  its 
power.  This  is  the  energizing  certitude.  One  who 
supposes  that  he  has  a  certainty  greater  than  this 
has  incomparably  less.  And  this  experimental,  ex¬ 
periential  confidence  includes  greater  confirmations 
than  any  we  have  yet  considered.  These  lead  us 
farther  into  humanity’s  spiritual  universe. 

§  2 

Humanity’s  spiritual  universe  is  an  interblended 
life.  We  are  not  merely  to  cherish  the  conviction 
that  those  whom  we  see  no  more  still  unfold  the 
spiritual  life,  apart  from  us,  “till  death  us  join.’’ 
We  cannot  be  content  with  even  a  temporary  break 
and  separation  in  humanity’s  spiritual  universe. 
The  hope  that  we  shall  be  with  them  includes  the 
demand  that  they  be  still  with  us.  To  think  other¬ 
wise  would  be  to  impute  to  them  the  absence  of  that 
which  has  been  the  very  essential  of  their  being.  If 
they  live  indeed,  their  life  is  that  which  it  has  been 
increasingly — their  unity  with  us  in  the  cause  we 
serve,  in  which  are  included  receptive  faith  and 
impartive  love.  This  is  the  postulate  which  we  must 
form  and  test. 

Dare  we  presume  to  say  what  their  life  is  in  that 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


195 


impenetrable  mystery!  We  must  distinguish  be¬ 
tween  the  mystery  and  the  blank.  The  blank  is  of 
the  forms  and  conditions,  to  us  inconceivable,  of  the 
life  which  has  ceased  to  make  connections  with  the 
physical.  Descriptions  of  the  hereafter,  picturings 
of  the  invisible,  are  idle  fancies.  They  are  fre¬ 
quently  morbid  and  gross.  If  they  who  are  in  the 
hereafter  should  try  to  tell  us — and  this  is  a  con¬ 
ception  rendered  meaningless  by  its  incongruities 
— how  could  we  understand  the  language  of  that 
which  is  by  us  untried,  unknown!  If  we  take  our 
imaginings  as  symbols  of  the  spiritual  reality,  the 
physical  symbol  may  reduce  the  symbolized  to  an 
unsubstantial  dream.  Or  if  we  attempt  more  than 
symbol,  the  hereafter  is,  in  such  an  apprehension, 
dragged  down  toward  a  materialism  like  that  which 
would  degrade  the  divine  into  physical  attributes. 
“The  former  things  are  passed  away.” 

Distinguishable  from  that  blank  is  the  mystery 
of  the  hereafter.  It  is  the  mystery  of  the  trans¬ 
cendent  unfoldings  of  the  spiritual  life  whose  essen¬ 
tials  in  their  beginnings  we  are  achieving  here.  It 
is  the  mystery  of  the  further  developments  of  re¬ 
ceptive  faith  and  impartive  love,  of  holinass  and  re¬ 
demptive  power,  of  devotion  to  the  cause  we  serve. 
These  unite  human  souls,  and  the  more  we  develop 
them,  the  closer  and  deeper  is  the  unity  wherein 
those  who  are  departed  from  our  sight  would  unite 
themselves  with  us.  What  strivings  are  theirs 
along  the  upward  way?  What  are  the  conflicts  and 
devotions  of  their  redeeming  energies  unto  the 
attainment  of  the  cause  they  serve,  which  is  the 


196  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

fulfillment  of  all  souls  in  humanity's  concrete,  in- 
terblended  life?  Such  outreachings  of  our  thoughts 
are  not  toward  the  blank  of  the  hereafter,  but  into 
its  mystery.  They  are  not  unanswered.  Yet  the 
deeper  our  consciousness  of  mystery,  the  finer  is  our 
reverence,  the  mightier  our  aspiration,  the  more 
penetrative  our  love.  The  mystery  is  our  assur¬ 
ance  of  their  blessedness,  for  we  know  that  the 
spiritual  life  is  in  itself  all  worth  and  joy.  How 
much  more  then  is  the  spiritual  life  the  blessed  life 
when  the  physical  hindrances  and  intrusions  have 
been  overpassed,  and  the  vast  conflicts  that  unfold 
are,  in  their  sacrificial  loves  and  intensities,  further 
attainments  of  that  life  which  is  all  worth  and  joy! 

Our  thoughts  of  the  hereafter  go  out  inevitably 
to  those  whose  spiritual  life,  while  they  were  in  this 
world,  now  draws  our  reverent  love  toward  their 
realm  of  essential  joy.  Yet  the  glorified  souls  whom 
we  adore  open  our  hearts  even  to  the  lowest  and 
the  vilest  that  have  gone  out  into  the  great  dark¬ 
ness.  For  those  who  are  like  their  supreme  leader 
are  impelled,  by  the  forces  of  forgiveness  and  re¬ 
demption,  to  follow  him  and  to  lead  us  along  his 
redemptive  way. 

There  are  tests  and  cultivations  of  this  fellow¬ 
ship.  Is  the  investigation  of  psychic  phenomena 
one  of  them? 

That  psychic  phenomena  are  legitimate  objects 
of  scientific  investigation  is  obvious.  But  it  is 
doubtful  whether  the  hypothesis  of  communication 
with  the  departed  has  been  of  value.  That  hypo- 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


197 


thesis  has  indeed  added  a  breathless  interest 
to  the  inquiry.  But  it  has  also  obstructed 
some  investigations  with  undiscriminating  prejudg- 
ments.  Ghoulish  charlatanry  has  not  been 
altogether  excluded,  and  the  impatient  credul¬ 
ity  which  is  a  recrudescence  of  animism  plus  a  piti¬ 
ful  sentimentality.  Whatever  elusive  human  powers 
may  be  discovered  and  developed  in  these  investiga¬ 
tions,  whatever  amazing  results  may  be  won,  it  is  a 
sane  postulate  that  explanations  are  to  be  found 
within  the  confines  of  our  mortal  life,  unless  that 
postulate  shall  prove  less  adequate  than  it  appears 
to  be  at  present. 

Spiritual  considerations  are  in  accord  with  such 
scientific  procedure.  The  hope  that  is  often  con¬ 
nected  with  the  investigation  of  psychic  phenomena 
would  bring  the  manifestations  of  the  departed 
down  into  the  physical.  At  best  this  attempt  ranks 
far  below  another,  which  is  really  spiritual.  It  is 
possible  that  the  attempt  through  psychic  phenom¬ 
ena  may  render  service  to  the  other  endeavor.  But 
its  main  tendency  at  least  is  not  now  in  that  direc¬ 
tion.  Of  its  service  the  higher  quest  feels  no  need. 
He  who  desires  to  know  the  communion  of  saints 
may  wisely  take  precaution  against  vision,  or  nerv¬ 
ous  ecstasy,  or  any  other  physical  intrusion.  If  the 
investigation  definitively  fails  of  any  result  beyond 
the  elucidation  of  powers,  normal  and  abnormal,  of 
this  mortal  stage,  that  falure  may  be  its  best  service 
to  the  spiritual  fellowship  which  those  who  are  here 
in  the  flesh  may  have  with  those  who  are  not  phy¬ 
sically  here  in  any  wise. 


198  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

There  is  one  such  experience  that  is  preeminent 
among  mortal  men’s  spiritual  experiences  of  the 
hereafter.  This  is  so  far  from  being  unique  that 
it  involves  a  universal  interchange  between  earth 
and  the  life  beyond  earth.  I  refer  to  the  communion 
of  Jesus’  disciples  with  their  crucified  Lord. 

That  eternal  fellowship  of  Jesus  with  his  dis¬ 
ciples  has  but  an  impermanent  connection  with  the 
legends  of  the  bodily  resurrection,  which  inevitably 
grew  around  it,  and  with  the  Easter  visions.  Such 
visions  do  not  prove  any  reality,  and  no  reality  is 
dependent  upon  them.  There  are  visions  innumer¬ 
able  from  all  sorts  of  occasions,  including  our  in¬ 
tense  affections.  No  vision  has  any  other  value  than 
that  which  may  belong  to  the  conviction  which  is 
physically  reflected  in  sight  and  hearing.  The 
legends,  which  may  spring  up  in  less  than  three 
days,  the  visions,  confusedly  reported  and  exag¬ 
gerated,  in  individuals  and  probably  in  groups  of 
men,  did  a  temporary  service,  perhaps  indispens¬ 
able,  in  seeming  confirmation  of  Jesus’  continuing 
life,  and  as  a  testimony  convincing  to  many  men  of 
that  time.  To  the  modern  man  they  have  no  greater 
significance,  and  whatever  other  significance  has 
been  imputed  to  them  must  be  eliminated  in  behalf 
of  the  reality  which  they,  with  all  their  beauty, 
distorted  and  materialized.  Of  importance  to  us 
are  those  innumerable  testimonies  to  the  living 
Jesus  given  by  ennobled  and  redemptive  lives  from 
the  apostles  on,  which  have  been  lived  in  that 
consciousness,  and  the  power,  both  direct  and 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


199 


mediated,  of  men's  experience  of  the  living  Christ 
to  energize  humanity's  spiritual  advance. 

There  are  perversions  of  this  experience,  as  there 
are  of  all  high  things.  Here  mawkish,  other-worldly, 
self-conceited,  loquacious  sentimentality  has  done 
its  worst.  Ecclesiasticism  has  not  hesitated  to  use 
the  presence  of  Jesus  as  its  chief  instrument  in  ex¬ 
ploiting  humanity.  Over  against  these  profanations 
stand  such  fine  reverences  as  Whittier's  “Our  Mas¬ 
ter,"  and  Gladden's  great  hymn  of  service.  In  both 
of  these,  as  instances,  there  is  independence  of 
christological  dogma,  and  an  all-empowering  prac¬ 
tical  social  inspiration.  By  this  test,  above  all 
others,  the  sanity  and  genuineness  of  this  conscious¬ 
ness  are  vindicated. 

This  social  inspiration  has  always  constituted 
the  power  of  the  faith  in  the  living  and  present 
Christ.  The  victorious  conviction  of  the  early 
Christians  was  of  Jesus'  inimitably  energizing  pres¬ 
ence  in  their  life  of  love  together,  in  their  winning 
of  others  into  this  holy  fellowship,  in  their  redemp¬ 
tive  invasion  of  the  world  in  his  name.  The  essen¬ 
tial  of  this  experience  has  endured.  There  has  al¬ 
ways  been  confessed  a  spiritual  communion  between 
the  noblest  human  soul  and  those  who  love  the 
noblest.  It  is  a  communion  rich  in  all  fruits  of 
spiritual  life.  It  is  strength  for  humanity’s  great 
task,  and  for  the  least  detail  of  that  task  in  the 
lowly  work  of  common  men. 

The  living  power  of  Jesus  pours  into  our  lives  his 
moral  strength,  his  mighty  tenderness,  his  devoted 
accomplishment  of  the  cause  we  serve.  It  opens 


200  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


itself  to  all  varieties  of  temperament  and  task.  It 
is  for  man  and  woman,  for  poet  and  administrator. 
It  is  congenial  both  to  the  mystical  temperament 
and  to  practical  efficiency.  It  belongs  to  every  type 
and  stage  of  culture.  It  is  for  childhood,  youth, 
maturity  and  old  age,  becoming  both  finer  and 
stronger  with  the  unfoldings  of  the  years.  It  em¬ 
powers  and  directs  our  aspirations  for  an  ever  more 
Christlike  social  order,  humanized  by  Jesus’  con¬ 
sciousness  of  what  the  human  is  and  must  attain. 
It  is  indissolubly  bound  to  his  mortal  ministry,  and 
especially  to  the  culmination  of  his  work  in  his  ter¬ 
rible  and  glorious  death,  even  as  our  thoughts  of 
our  beloved  who  are  beyond  our  sight  are  linked 
with  our  memories  of  them. 

Dogmatism  has  alleged  the  essential  difference 
between  the  divine  Christ  and  humanity.  Human¬ 
ism  reverences  Jesus  as  incomparable  source  of  re¬ 
generated  humanity.  But  the  humanist,  accepting 
no  superhuman  God,  cannot  confess  a  superhuman 
Christ.  He  cannot  attribute  to  Jesus  the  unhuman 
monopoly  of  uniting  this  world  and  the  hereafter. 
To  the  inmost  heart  of  Jesus  belongs  the  desire  that 
all  men  should  become  what  he  is  in  holiness  and 
helpfulness,  and  therefore  in  the  task,  both  here 
and  there,  of  uniting  the  seen  and  the  unseen  in 
one  spiritual  universe.  In  this  work  we  are  united 
with  those  who  are  united  with  him.  There  is  one 
great  cause,  and  one  unbroken  host  of  those  who 
serve  the  cause  in  loyalty  to  the  leader  who  has 
identified  himself  with  the  cause. 

Our  spiritual  and  eternal  life  with  the  Master 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE  201 

can  be  spoken  of,  with  the  inevitable  personal  re¬ 
serves,  because  of  its  universality.  Our  spiritual 
life  with  our  beloved  unseen  can  be  acknowledged 
because  of  its  potential  universality.  Love  is  not 
the  God  of  the  dead,  but  the  God  of  the  living.  But 
detailed  testimony  of  such  spiritual  experience  is 
not  to  be  uttered.  It  may  be  intimated  symbolically, 
lyrically,  by  musician,  artist,  poet;  for  such  ex¬ 
pressions,  imaginative,  universal,  have  their  own 
magnificent  reserves,  never  to  be  overpassed. 

One  of  the  world’s  great  teachers  has  made  an 
appeal  for  the  opening  of  our  civilization  to  the 
powers  of  the  world  to  come.*  Bergson  considers 
this  necessary  in  order  to  supply  the  spiritual  lacks 
of  our  civilization,  and  to  attain  the  spiritual  fulfill¬ 
ment  of  its  secular  tasks.  The  occasion  of  his  utter¬ 
ance  made  fitting  an  application  to  the  Investiga¬ 
tion  of  psychic  phenomena.  But  his  thought  did 
not  stop  there.  He  made  no  prejudgment  concern¬ 
ing  the  results  of  these  investigations,  nor  would 
his  plea  lose  any  of  its  force,  if  these  experiments 
fail  to  gain  communication  between  this  world  and 
the  hereafter.  His  desire  is  that  the  world  shall  re¬ 
ceive  the  energies  of  that  higher  stage  of  spiritual 
development  from  its  living  source;  and  this  source 
is  the  human  souls  that  have  gone  on. 

How  shall  we  receive  them  into  our  lives?  Every 
thrice-hallowed  communion  with  them  is  for  our 
eternal  task  together,  which  is  our  eternal  life  to¬ 
gether.  We  receive  them  by  making  all  the  aims 

♦Bergson’s  Inaugural  Address  as  president  of  the  British  Society 
of  Psychical  Research. 


202  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

of  life  spiritual  aims,  by  giving  ourselves  alto¬ 
gether  to  the  cause  we  and  they  serve.  The  more 
deeply  we  share  their  purpose,  the  more  intimate 
are  the  blendings  of  their  life,  which  is  their  task, 
with  ours.  By  this  reception  of  them  must  all  our 
present  experiences  of  the  eternal  life  be  tested,  to 
determine  whether  they  are  genuinely  spiritual,  and 
therefore  real,  or  fond  imaginings.  There  is  attain¬ 
able  such  an  intersphering  of  our  devoted  lives  with 
theirs,  that  the  eternal  life  in  this  consummation  of 
the  social  passion,  becomes  the  very  consciousness 
of  our  existence,  the  essential  of  our  being,  reality 
at  the  heart  of  all  reality. 

We  have  glanced  at  the  disastrous  consequences, 
when  a  nation  or  a  phase  of  civilization  breaks  with 
that  advancing  flood  of  human  life  which  we  call 
history.  We  keep  the  connection  close  and  effective 
when  we  recognize  it  as  with  the  living,  not  with 
the  dead. 


§  3 

Does  humanity  include  any  whose  habitation  has 
not  been  this  earth?  A  negative  answer  would  not 
affect  our  affirmation  of  humanity's  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse,  which  is  composed  of  all  the  human  spirits 
there  are,  comprises  all  the  humanity  there  is, 
whether  its  mansions  be  few  or  many,  its  personal 
components  less  or  more. 

Physical  science,  which  up  to  this  time  has  re¬ 
turned  no  affirmative  answer,  cannot  reach  the 
negative  answer.  When  there  are  found  in  planet 
after  planet  conditions  that  make  impossible  any 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


203 


approach  to  the  physical  functions  of  life  as  we 
know  them  here,  that  conclusion  must  not  be  ex¬ 
tended  beyond  its  proper  scope.  Though  this  ver¬ 
dict  should  be  rendered  upon  every  stage  of  every 
heavenly  body,  we  have  no  warrant  to  limit  spiritual 
human  life  to  the  forms  we  know  or  can  conjecture. 

There  are  intimations  of  spiritual  human  influ¬ 
ence  from  above  us  and  around  us.  They  breathed 
into  Jesus’  soul  from  the  lilies  of  the  field,  and  into 
souls  of  a  spiritual  sensitiveness  like  his.  To  earth’s 
exquisite  voices  our  hearts  reecho  wonder  and  de¬ 
light,  beauty  and  sublimity;  and  spiritual  splendors 
descend  to  us  from  sun  and  cloud,  and  from  the 
august  revelations  of  the  night.  All  these  impart 
to  us  reverent  strengthenings  and  purifyings  for 
the  cause  we  serve.  These  influences  are  socially 
recognized,  socially  potent.  They  unite  those  who 
look  and  listen  together,  even  as  the  lips  of  lovers 
meet  beneath  the  stars.  It  is  the  province  of  the 
landscape  artist  so  to  reveal  nature  that  it  shall 
blend  men’s  hearts.  These  influences  we  can  attri¬ 
bute  to  nothing  physical.  Neither  can  we  be  satis¬ 
fied  to  attribute  them  merely  to  ourselves.  Still 
more  significant  of  their  implicit  humanness  is  the 
experience  that  we  “look  upon  them  with  exceeding 
love.”  The  answer  to  our  question  is  an  increasing 
hopefulness  of  the  human  spiritual  universe  all 
around  us  and  above  us.  And  the  increasing  hope¬ 
fulness  is  the  deepening  experience  of  an  inter- 
blended  life  with  these  appealing  presences  that  are 
more  than  things. 

There  is  a  way  to  this  larger  spiritual  scope,  not 


204  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

different  from  that  which  has  been  intimated,  but 
its  continuation.  The  farther  advance  I  must  leave 
to  others  to  tell,  after  a  mere  mention  of  it.  Philo¬ 
sophy's  highest  endeavor  is  the  construction  of 
reality  by  the  spiritual  interpretation  of  all  things. 
Those  who  dare  this  adventure  have  found  it  im¬ 
possible  to  think  that  the  physical  gives  us  final 
reality.  The  creative  origin  of  the  physical  aspect, 
they  may  discover  in  humanity's  imperfect  appre¬ 
hension  of  itself,  which  it  must  progressively  over¬ 
come  in  thought,  in  experience,  in  victorious  recon¬ 
struction  of  all  that  is.  The  humanist  finds  no  anti¬ 
cipations  of  a  conceptual  universe,  of  an  all-engulf- 
ing  absolute,  but  his  progress  is  into  humanity's 
concrete  interblending  of  personal  souls.  This  high 
adventure  is  not  in  my  present  task.  That  it  is 
undertaken  increases  our  hopefulness  of  a  human 
spiritual  universe  all  around  us  and  above  us.  It 
is  only  experience  that  can  prove  it  to  be  so.  The 
unfolding  of  spiritual  humanity  may  find  it  so.  And 
deep  implications  of  humanity  even  in  our  present 
experience  lead  that  way. 

The  social  passion  has  its  inspiring  mysteries, 
which  extend  into  the  ultimate  mystery.  Yet  we  de 
not  need  to  wait  for  reality's  final  word.  Human¬ 
ity's  spiritual  universe  is,  whatever  its  scope. 

The  social  passion,  occupied  with  the  work  next 
its  hand,  possesses,  for  the  energizing  and  satisfac¬ 
tion  of  every  detail  of  its  work,  the  universal  spirit¬ 
ual  significance.  In  every  service  the  purpose  is 
the  self-realization  of  the  spiritual  universe  of  hu¬ 
manity's  interblended  personal  social  life,  here  and 


HUMANITY’S  SPIRITUAL  UNIVERSE 


205 


in  the  hereafter,  and  in  whatever  worlds.  This 
universal  significance  and  aim  is  in  every  reception 
of  human  faith,  in  every  impartation  of  human  love, 
in  every  energy  of  forgiveness  and  redemption,  in 
every  devotion  to  the  cause  we  serve. 


X 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

Forgive,  dear  God,  that  we  have  sought  Thy  face 
Elsewhere  than  in  these  human  faces  dear, 

That  our  cold  heart  has  thought  to  win  Thy  grace 
Save  in  their  conquering  smile,  atoning  tear. 

The  throne  vain  fancy  sets  above  the  skies , 
Transcendencies  our  pompous  schemes  essay, — 
Before  the  holy  light  of  human  eyes 
Flooding  our  souls,  the  shadows  flee  away; 

And  when  we  claim  Thee  human,  then  we  find 
Not  less,  but  ever  more  and  more  of  Thee, — 
Exhaustless  thought  with  simplest  task  entwined — 
Deepest  because  the  closest  mystery . 


Part  1 


WHATEVER  the  advances  of  thought  in 
spiritualizing  our  conceptions  of  that 
which  we  have  been  accustomed  to  regard 
as  outside  humanity,  our  practical  attitude  to  that 
world  is  clear.  We  are  to  subdue  it  to  the  human. 
In  and  from  and  against  the  world,  humanity 
achieves  the  one  thing  precious,  its  own  soul.  For 
this  purpose  science  must  press  forward  on  its  end¬ 
less  way.  To  this  end  experiment  must  never  be 


206 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


207 


weary  of  seeking  the  masteries  of  all  things  by 
soul.  In  this  sense  we  are  “citizens  of  the  uni¬ 
verse/ '  It  is  the  realm  to  be  conquered  by  the  soul, 
in  the  conquest  which  develops  each  man  in  the 
advance  of  humanity’s  interblended  life. 

§1 

We  have  surrendered  to  the  physical  universe 
much  that  must  be  yielded  back  to  our  indefeasible 
claim.  When  Wordsworth  said,  “Little  we  see  in 
nature  that  is  ours,”  his  words  imply  those  things 
in  nature  that  are  ours  if  we  really  see  them.  There 
are  mysterious  forces  of  nature  which  are  as  essen¬ 
tial  to  our  spiritual  life  as  are  words  from  human 
lips  and  expressions  of  human  faces.  It  is  signi¬ 
ficant  that  they  often  come  to  us  when  we  are  alone, 
or  in  the  most  intimate  of  companionships,  in  soli¬ 
tary  places,  wild  stretches  of  mountain  or  sea.  We 
have  seen  these  transformed,  revealed  by  sunsets 
whose  splendor  stopped  for  an  instant  the  tides  of 
our  mortal  being,  and  the  heart  forgot  to  beat, 
and  then  the  tremendous  glory  passed  with  sublime 
reposefulness  into  the  dawning  of  the  stars.  From 
such  vast  majesties,  there  have  been  created  great 
energies  in  our  lives  and  in  humanity’s  life.  A 
humanism  that  fails  to  take  account  of  these  would 
be  a  paltry  thing,  unworthy  to  be  an  abiding  pres¬ 
ence  among  the  spaces  and  the  times. 

These  formations  and  directions  of  our  life  are 
not  physical,  whatever  their  relation  to  the  physical 
may  be.  Experiences  of  them,  it  is  important  to 
observe,  are  not  overwhelmings  of  the  human  by 


208  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

physical  size  and  power,  for  these  experiences  exalt 
the  consciousness  of  soul  above  any  extent  or  dura¬ 
tion  of  physical  things.  They  are  above  our  com¬ 
prehension,  but  it  must  be  our  untiring  endeavor 
to  comprehend  them  from  more  to  more.  Their 
mystery  is  included  in  the  mystery  of  the  human 
soul,  interpreter  of  all  mysteries.  Let  their  essen¬ 
tial  nature  be  estimated  by  their  effect:  he  knows 
best  the  contemplative  delight  and  awe  of  them 
who  finds  them  to  be  calming,  impelling  powers  of 
action  unto  the  supreme  object  of  spiritual  faith, 
the  cause  we  serve.  Humanity  is  this  cause  and 
becoming,  and  experiences  of  nature  reveal  their 
human  significance  by  pouring  themselves  into  this 
cause  and  becoming. 

The  aesthetic  experience,  to  which  men  have  given 
little  heed,  because  most  men,  especially  in  the 
age  of  physical  science,  are  so  blind  to  what  the 
artist  sees,  so  deaf  to  what  the  musician  hears,  is  a 
spiritual  affirmation.  Whatever  physical  elements 
it  recognizes  it  subordinates.  Every  physical  inter¬ 
pretation  of  it  destroys  its  meaning.  Or  if  one 
should  insist,  upon  whatever  grounds,  that  the 
beautiful  and  the  sublime  are  of  the  physical,  one 
then  gives  to  the  physical  a  spiritual  meaning, 
transforms  it  into  soul.  That  which  we  receive 
from  nature  is  not  something  different  from  our¬ 
selves.  It  is  an  enlarged  social  consciousness  that 
we  receive,  an  intensified  social  passion.  As  vast 
as  the  stars  proclaim  it,  is  the  human  soul,  human¬ 
ity's  interblended  life. 

From  all  that  in  nature  which  delights,  refines, 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION  209 

elevates,  empowers  us,  they  who  once  shared  with 
us  are  not  shut  out.  They  who  are  beyond  the 
physical  have  the  spiritual,  the  human,  which  is 
the  essential,  inexhaustably  varied  loveliness  and 
glory  of  that  which  is  dimmed  by  the  medium  of 
our  mortal  sight.  Therefore  every  apprehension 
of  natural  beauty  awakens  thoughts  of  them;  and 
thoughts  of  them  lead  us  deeper,  guided  by  their 
vision,  into  the  realities  of  beauty  within  the  things 
we  see. 

There  are  other  influences,  no  less  vital  than  the 
spiritualized  aesthetic  insight,  which  connect  us 
with  earth  and  skies.  The  evolutionary  conscious¬ 
ness,  which  has  become  indispensable  to  thought 
and  life,  is  more  than  can  be  expressed  by  any 
formulations  of  science.  Our  relations  with  animal 
life  and  all  its  constituents  and  environments  are 
so  intimate  that  we  hail  earth  as  our  mother,  with 
a  far  deeper  meaning  than  any  past  age  has  sus¬ 
pected.  And  this  earth  is  so  united  with  all  other 
things  and  forces  that  we,  as  children  of  earth,  are 
citizens  of  the  universe. 

There  are  considerations  suggested  here  beyond 
what  this  writing  undertakes.  Yet,  even  without 
these,  man's  distinguishing  practical  attitude 
toward  the  world  is  clear.  To  appropriate  all  that 
is  in  alliance  with  the  soul's  task  of  personal  and 
social  self-realizations,  continually  transforming 
and  transcending  that  which  we  appropriate,  and 
to  achieve  ourselves  from  every  opposition,  against 
which  the  soul  wins  itself,  this  is  the  practical  dis¬ 
tinction  which  humanity's  spiritual  life  acts  upon. 


210  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


Both  from  and  against  the  world  humanity  achieves 
the  one  precious  possession,  its  own  soul.* 

§2 

Again  we  meet  the  physical  as  the  immense 
antagonist.  But  humanity  that  is  really  conscious 
of  itself  does  not  fear  to  look  its  enemy  in  the  face. 
We  are  a  growing  humanity.  Every  soul  is  a  new 
consummation  and  development  of  humanity,  pour¬ 
ing  itself  as  a  new  creation  into  the  continual  in¬ 
crease  of  humanity's  interblended  life.  Every  re¬ 
ceptive  faith  and  every  impartive  love,  which  ful¬ 
fills  receptive  faith,  bear  witness  to  the  continual 
increase  of  humanity's  spiritual  universe  of  con¬ 
cretely  interblended  souls,  with  eternity  in  its 
heart.  Unto  us  the  soulless,  soul-repressive  antag¬ 
onist  is  compelled  to  surrender  the  essentially  hu¬ 
man  which  has  been  so  confusedly  ascribed  to  it, 
and  its  very  reality  as  independent  of  us  is  a  worse 
than  dubious  claim. 

We  need  not  dread  the  physical  in  its  most  for¬ 
midable  confronting  of  the  soul.  At  death,  the 
physical  is  either  all-powerful  or  utterly  powerless. 
As  we  watch  the  last  mortal  hours,  we  see  one  of 
two  things  being  accomplished:  either  the  soul  is 
being  destroyed  by  the  physical  process,  or  the  soul 
is  ceasing  to  make  physical  connections.  For 

*May  I  refer  the  reader  to  my  book,  The  Christian  Reconstruc¬ 
tion  of  Modern  Life?  A  theory  of  the  nature  of  the  physical  is  not 
necessary  for  the  purpose,  of  this  writing.  The  physical  may  be,  as 
has  already  been  mentioned,  that  aspect  of  reality  which  we  our¬ 
selves  construct,  in  this  imperfect  phase  of  our  development,  and 
which  has  significance  as  subdued  and  transformed  to  the  purpoa«a 
of  the  spiritual  life. 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


211 


science  has  stultified  the  expectation  of  the  survival 
of  any  physical  element  in  a  consciousness  beyond 
death.  If  we  refuse  to  admit  that  the  soul  is  de¬ 
stroyed  by  the  physical  process — and  that  refusal  is 
essential  to  humanity — then  in  the  last  of  the  last 
gentle  expirations  we  see  the  destruction  of  the 
physical  by  the  soul.  A  physical  universe  which 
no  longer  exists  to  spirits  in  the  spiritual  realm,  is 
not  a  thing  to  be  reverenced  or  feared. 

This  affimation  of  the  spiritual  in  the  process  of 
dissolution,  when  physical  connections  are  loosened 
and  at  length  annulled,  is  also  evident  in  the  midst 
of  our  mortal  life.  When  we  are  awed  and  thrilled 
by  an  act  of  devoted  heroism,  a  smile  of  spiritual 
loveliness,  and  when  in  their  radiance  we  consider 
man,  what  are  all  material  things  that  man  should 
be  mindful  of  them,  what  are  physical  immensities 
that  the  soul  should  be  other  than  a  visitant  among 
them ! 

The  physical  universe,  in  the  practical  distinc¬ 
tion  of  it  from  the  spiritual,  imposes  itself  upon 
men  because  it  is  very  big,  and  very  strong,  and 
very  old.  To  begin  with  bigness — there  is  no 
reason  why  the  winner  of  his  own  soul  should  be 
outfaced  by  any  degree  of  that.  The  big  circus 
elephant  was  magniloquently  depicted  on  the  pos¬ 
ters  as  a  hundred  times  bigger  than  the  little  boy 
who  laughed  with  delight,  when  he  saw  him  tow¬ 
ering  in  the  parade.  But  if  he  had  been  a  trillion 
times  as  big,  or  a  trillion  trillion  trillion  times  as 
big,  if  he  were  an  elephantine  universe,  the  child 
who  persists  in  every  spiritual  manhood  laughs  at 


212  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


the  notion,  that  the  biggest  physical  bigness  can 
be  brought  into  comparison  with  the  greatness  of 
the  human  soul. 

And  the  omnipresence  of  God — see  how  big  he 
is!  Is  there  anything  in  that  physical  attribute  of 
deity  which  shall  bend  my  knee?  In  the  absence 
of  that  elephantine  attribute  shall  I  adore  him  less? 
Must  I  be  diverted  from  my  service  to  the  Holy 
Spirit  of  humanity,  to  worship  a  big  deity  of  all  the 
worlds? 

But  the  elephant  is  not  only  much  bigger  than 
the  pleased  spectator,  but  ever  and  ever  so  many 
times  physically  stronger.  And  if  he  were  decil- 
lions  multiplied  into  decillions  stronger,  an  inimit¬ 
ably  elephantine  universe  of  physical  energies,  why 
should  any  little  child,  growing  in  receptive  faith 
and  impartive  love,  be  abashed  before  omnipotence? 
And  if  God  has  no  connection  with  physical  om¬ 
nipotence,  shall  we  adore  him  the  less?  And  if  it 
is  a  very  old  elephant,  so  old  that  his  duration  is 
from  everlasting,  is  the  measure  of  duration  the 
measure  of  adoration?  Would  we  reverence  God 
less  if  we  should  cease  to  say,  in  the  physical  con¬ 
notations  of  the  words  used  in  the  same  meaning 
as  in  the  measurements  of  the  physical  universe, 
“From  everlasting  to  everlasting  thou  art  God?*” 

When  we  speak  of  the  divine  omniscience  of 
physical  things,  we  approach  problems  of  knowl- 

*The  idea  of  time  involves  difficulties  all  but  insurmountable. 
The  attempt  of  thought  and  of  ecstasy  to  escape  from  time  into  a 
timeless  eternity  seems  to  humanists,  and  to  many  others,  to  attain 
no  meaning.  But  a  vital  distinction  concerning  time  has  been 
offered,  by  masters  in  philosophy  reinforced  by  masters  in  physical 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


213 


edge  and  reality  which  are  beyond  the  scope  of  this 
book.f  I  trust  that  the  second  part  of  this  chapter 
may  make  sufficiently  clear  that  our  devoted  adora¬ 
tion  could  not  be  deepened  by  the  assumption  that 
God  possesses  always  the  exact  and  complete  un¬ 
derstanding  of  every  detail  of  the  physical  universe. 
Such  erudition  will  not,  I  think,  seem  essential  to 
the  spiritual  life  which  we  revere,  to  the  cause 
which  we  serve. 

Indeed,  I  am  conscious  of  no  travesty  or  irrever¬ 
ence.  If  the  religious  sentiments  of  any  reader  are 
affronted,  let  him  reflect  whether  he  has  not  so 
connected  spiritual  convictions  with  notions  of  the 
physical  attributes  of  deity  that  the  depreciation 
of  the  latter  seems  to  him  irreverence  to  the  former. 
It  is  in  behalf  of  these  spiritual  convictions  and  as¬ 
pirations  that  I  am  pleading.  Conceptions  of  the 
physically  related  size,  strength,  and  duration  of 
deity,  and  of  his  wisdom  physically  applied,  seem 
to  some  of  us  pagan  survivals  in  a  Christianity 
essentially  spiritual  indeed,  but  still  in  process  of 
finding  itself. 

When  prophet  and  psalmist  attained  monotheism 


science,  which  makes  a  practical  appeal  to  the  spiritual  life.  It  is 
the  distinction  between  the  time  wre  reckon  by  and  the  time  we 
live  in — between  time  as  the  measurement  of  the  duration  of  the 
physical  and  time  as  the  soul’s  experience.  The  former  belongs  to 
the  physical  world,  the  latter  to  humanity’s  spiritual  life.  For  the 
formulation,  unfoldings,  acute  discriminations  and  detailed  applica¬ 
tions  of  this  distinction,  the  reader  is  referred  to  Bergson  especially, 
to  whose  conception  Einstein  has  made  an  important  contribution. 
But  the  mere  statement  of  the  evident  distinction  frees  from  physi¬ 
cal  intrusion  and  obscuration  the  life  of  humanity’s  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse. 

The  troublesome  conception  of  beginning  is  evidently  in  need  of 
the  same  distinction. 

tThe  traditional  conception  of  omniscience  includes  an  undiscrimi¬ 
nated  confusion  of  the  spiritual  and  the  physical. 


214  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

they  did  not  therefore  surmount  altogether  the  in¬ 
veterate  pagan  nature-worship.  This  paganism 
can  be  applied  to  one  God  as  well  as  to  many  gods. 
Monotheism  is  only  an  advance  toward  the  religion 
of  the  spirit — not  always  an  advance.  In  our  time, 
when  the  conceptions  of  the  spatial  and  temporal 
boundaries  of  the  physical  universe  are  immensely 
extended,  and  apprehensions  of  its  energies  inimit¬ 
ably  multiplied,  there  is  the  same  paganism,  enor¬ 
mously  increased,  which  would  drag  God  down  into 
physical  attributes.  Ancient  prophets  and  psalm¬ 
ists  had  this  advantage  over  us :  their  physical  uni¬ 
verse  was  so  small  and  weak  and  young  that  they 
were  able  to  conceive  a  divine  physical  power  above 
it,  and  around  it,  and  penetrating  it  without  being 
lost  in  it,  and  before  and  after  it.  To  us  the  physi¬ 
cal  universe  is  so  indefinitely  big  and  strong  and 
old  that  our  deity  of  physical  attributes  cannot 
definitely  free  himself  from  it.  His  physical  attri¬ 
butes  attach  themselves  to  the  physical.  He  per¬ 
ishes,  but  it  remains. 

When  we  find  that  we  owe  no  reverence  to  the 
physical,  there  is  danger  of  our  reverting  to  its 
apparent  opposite,  to  a  Platonic  or  Hegelian  uni¬ 
verse  of  conceptions — or  concepts,  or  categories,  or 
abstractions,  or  whatever  one  chooses  to  call  them 
— whether  considered  as  unchanging  or  as  self- 
developing.  It  is  in  this  realm  as  well  as  in  the 
physical,  that  much  of  our  traditional  theology  has 
sought  God.  To  confute  such  imaginations  by  proc¬ 
esses  of  reasoning  is  no  present  concern  of  mine. 
We  may  watch  the  humanistic  army  of  the  heights 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


215 


inflicting  shocks  that  send  them  reeling.  We  of  the 
valley  who,  in  our  simplicity,  have  given  ourselves 
to  the  social  passion  because  we  saw  no  other  life 
worth  living,  have  found  men  to  serve ;  not  lifeless 
conceptions,  but  the  concrete,  interblended  life  of 
men  which  we  call  humanity.  It  is  here  that  we 
seek  God.* 

*It  cannot  be  urged  against  religious  humanism  that  its  attempt 
has  already  been  made,  and  has  been  repudiated.  We  are  Comte’s 
debtors,  not  his  disciples.  Our  affirmation  of  the  hereafter,  which 
he  rejected,  makes  a  decisive  difference.  For  that  also  means  an 
attitude  tovyard  the  physical  universe  other  than  his.  There  are 
other  differences,  but  it  is  enough  to  mention  these  obvious  ones. 
This  is  said  with  all  reverent  gratitude  to  a  great  mind  and  soul. 


X 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


Part  2 


§  1 


HE  life  which  strives  to  be  an  undivided, 


complete  devotion  has  the  right  to  call  itself 


religious.  We  therefore  speak  of  the  relig¬ 
ion  of  the  social  passion,  not  as  something  which 
the  social  passion  possesses,  but  as  that  which  it  is. 
Every  element  and  moment  of  life  must,  according 
to  its  demand,  be  devoted  to  the  cause  we  serve, 
and  is  therein  hallowed  and  glorified.  It  is  a  life 
undivided  in  its  devotion,  as  no  life  can  be  which 
attempts  to  serve  both  the  human  and  the  super¬ 
human. 

The  social  passion  is  religious  in  its  receptive 
faith.  This  faith,  in  its  union  of  complete  depend¬ 
ence  and  closest  intimacy  with  that  from  which  life 
is  received,  is  free  from  the  externalizations  and 
mechanizations  of  those  impositions  which,  in 
faith’s  name,  suppress  the  soul.  Since  this  faith 
is  itself  self-surrender,  and  is  receptive  of  impartive 
love,  it  fulfills  itself  in  love.  Faith  and  love  in  one, 
uniting  the  whole  life  to  that  object  which  sum¬ 
mons  to  its  service  all  elements  and  every  moment 
of  life,  constitute  a  religious  life  ethical,  holy,  re¬ 
demptive. 


216 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


217 


The  social  passion  is  religious  in  its  subjugation 
of  the  physical  to  the  spiritual.  Its  spirituality  is 
the  eternal  victory  of  the  spirit.  It  is  religious  in 
uniting  men  in  a  communion  and  fellowship  potenti¬ 
ally  inclusive  of  every  human  soul,  in  this  world 
and  in  the  hereafter,  and  however  vast  the  scope 
of  humanity  may  be  and  may  become.  A  formally 
enrolled  membership  would  seem  to  detract  from 
that  real  communion  of  human  souls  whose  hearts 
humanity  has  touched,  and  who  are  united  through 
every  variety  of  ministry,  into  the  supreme 
ministry.  This  religion  needs  no  formal  cultus,  be¬ 
yond  its  own  inexhaustible  self-expressions. 

Its  participations  in  the  spiritual  elements  and 
developments  of  historic  Christianity,  and  its  allegi¬ 
ance  to  Jesus  as  the  supreme  expression  of  that 
which  it  recognizes  as  supreme,  mark  the  religion 
of  the  social  passion  as  in  and  of  the  historic 
development  of  the  human  spirit.  Its  enrichments 
of  life’s  richest  values,  its  humility  of  all  lowly 
sympathies  and  services,  its  fulfillments  of  every 
normal  human  task — these  vitalities  make  it  no 
less  religious,  but  transform  all  that  is  human  into 
the  life  of  the  spirit. 

Such  a  religious  consciousness  could  not  be,  if 
the  object  of  the  social  passion  were  inadequate. 
That  object  is  the  cause  we  serve,  which  is  the 
perfecting  of  humanity’s  concrete  interblended  life. 
Can  we  give  to  that  the  supreme  name?  Is  the 
religion  of  the  social  passion  consummated  in  the 
God  of  the  social  passion? 


218  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

If  God  is  superhuman,  then  the  social  passion 
would  be,  as  Buddhism  is  said  to  be,  a  religion  with¬ 
out  a  God.  And  if  God  must  be  considered  to  be 
personal,  with  the  limitations  of  individual  person¬ 
ality,  the  religion  of  the  social  passion  has  no  such 
God.  But  if  the  demand  for  the  personal  God  means 
the  God  with  whom  we  can  be  in  most  intimate 
personal  fellowship,  because  our  personalities  are 
fulfilled  in  him,  the  inquiry  is  open  to  us  whether 
the  religion  of  the  social  passion  does  not  grant 
this  supreme  longing  of  the  human  soul.  No  formu¬ 
lation  of  the  conception  of  deity  so  experienced 
seems  to  the  humanist  necessary  or  possible.  If 
the  religion  of  the  social  passion  is  that  experience 
of  God,  which  so  increases  that  no  formulation  of 
deity  can  be  the  final  word,  then  we  reverently 
claim  that  God  is  ours,  and  we  are  his. 

It  is  not  enough  that  our  faith  in  God  should 
be  merely  a  permissible  interpretation,  or  one 
element  among  others,  of  the  religion  of  the  social 
passion.  “As  the  hart  panteth  after  the  water- 
brooks,  so  thirsteth  my  soul  after  the  living  God.” 
For  the  deeper  consciousness  of  our  religious  needs, 
we  would  do  well  to  turn  from  the  superficialities 
of  our  own  time,  which  is  just  emerging,  as  we  dare 
to  hope,  from  the  domination  of  physical  science,  to 
the  great  utterances,  the  profound  convictions,  the 
mighty  visions  of  simpler,  truer  ages.  We  may  open 
our  souls  to  the  noblest  passages  of  Hebrew  prophet 
and  psalmist,  and  most  of  all  to  Jesus,  whose  life 
was  one  consummate  prayer.  And  with  them,  and 


THE  GOU  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


219 


with  those  whom  Jesus  filled  most  directly  with  his 
own  religious  passion,  we  may  ally  the  thirst  for 
God  witnessed  by  the  deepest  religious  conscious¬ 
ness  of  Iran  and  India,  and  of  other  lands  which 
make  manifest  our  occidental  poverty  of  soul,  and 
we  may  revere  the  experience  of  simple  hearts  even 
among  us,  which  have  found  God  and  are  forever 
satisfied.  Whatever  manifestation  of  religion 
appears  contrary  to  our  humanism — and  belief  in  a 
superhuman  God  has  appeared  to  us  to  be  the 
opposite  of  humanism — we  must  not  so  much  re¬ 
place  as  reconstruct  by  a  deeper  spiritual  conscious¬ 
ness,  a  mightier  religious  devotion,  one  with  the 
length  and  breadth  and  depth  and  height  of  human¬ 
ity's  spiritual  universe,  for  the  task  given  wholly 
to  the  cause  we  serve. 

A  thorough  treatment  of  the  subject  of  this  chap¬ 
ter  would  involve  a  description  of  religious  needs, 
and  the  demonstration  that  they  all  are  satisfied  in 
the  purely  human  religion  of  the  social  passion.  But 
such  an  undertaking,  which  would  involve  an  ex¬ 
haustive  study  of  the  religious  consciousness,  is 
far  beyond  the  limits  of  this  writing.  It  would  have 
to  be  an  historic  study,  an  exploration  of  humanity's 
expanding  soul.  A  single  reflection  is  attempted, 
which  however  is  presented  as  both  a  universal  ex¬ 
perience  and  as  implying  the  satisfaction  of  funda¬ 
mental  religious  demands.  It  does  not  seem  neces¬ 
sary  to  go  beyond  that  experience,  to  make  infer¬ 
ences  from  it,  or  explanations  of  it  from  anything 
beyond  it,  but  only  to  begin  to  enter  the  depth  of 
just  the  experience  itself. 


220  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

There  may  be  cited  as  a  significant  example  of 
that  experience,  the  child's  reception  of  spiritual 
life  from  the  mother's  soul.  In  that  receptive  faith 
there  are  two  indivisible  essentials,  one  of  which 
it  may  be  permissible  to  repeat,  for  the  sa.ka  of  the 
other  not  yet  adequately  emphasized. 

Concerning  the  first:  when  the  faith  of  the  little 
child  receives  spiritual  life  from  the  mother’s  soul, 
the  interblended  life  of  humanity  is  received.  The 
mother's  own  life  has  been  formed  from  that 
humanity  in  a  new  personal  creation,  and  this  she 
gives  to  the  child.  From  the  concrete  interblended 
life  in  her  is  born  the  child's  own  personal  social 
life.  The  creative  touch  of  her  personality  upon 
the  child  is  the  touch  of  humanity's  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse,  unfolding  its  impartive  creation  to  the  child, 
with  his  every  responsive  development  of  the  re¬ 
ceptive  faith,  which  fulfills  itself  in  impartive  love. 

The  second  essential,  which  is  now  to  be  emphas¬ 
ized,  and  which  is  implicit  in  the  first,  is  that  this 
impartive  mother-touch  of  humanity's  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse  is  personal.  All  that  this  imparting  contains 
and  unfolds  is  personal.  Thus  the  child  feels  it 
and  appropriates  it.  It  is  all  creative  of  personal¬ 
ity  from  itself.  And  in  every  faith  of  man  in  man, 
which  is  always  receptive  of  the  spiritual  universe, 
that  spiritual  universe  is  experienced  as  personal, 
is  touch  of  soul  on  soul.  It  is  indeed  social,  else  it 

could  not  be  personal.  Every  power  of  it,  known, 

* 

surmised,  or  to  be  unfolded,  comes  to  us  as  purely 
personal,  touch  of  soul  on  soul.  Every  receptive 
faith  must  respond  to  just  that  which  is  offered, 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION  221 

and  accept  it  as  personal  imparting.  Whatever  in 
the  personal  God  the  soul  longs  for,  is  given  in  the 
impartive  touch  of  humanity’s  spiritual  universe, 
most  clearly,  deeply,  humanly. 

Inseparable  are  receptive  faith  and  impartive 
love.  But  now  to  emphasize  the  latter  element  of 
spiritual  life:  it  was  said  that  whenever  one  gives 
a  cup  of  cold  water  in  the  name  of  a  disciple,  it  is 
to  the  concrete  interblended  life  of  humanity  that 
one  gives.  To  give  in  the  name  of  a  disciple  is  to 
give  as  Jesus  gave,  every  least  gift  being  the  accom¬ 
paniment,  expression,  and  medium  of  the  soul’s  gift 
of  itself.  In  that  giving,  and  in  all  its  reimpartings 
throughout  humanity’s  spiritual  universe,  the  gift 
has  always  its  personal  object.  Humanity’s  inter¬ 
blended  life  meets  us  in  every  gift  of  ourselves, 
and  meets  us  as  personal  recipient  of  our  devotion. 

f  Whenever  the  great  spiritual  life  touches  us  in  our 
faith’s  receiving,  whenever  we  touch  it  in  our  love’s 
imparting,  it  is  always  personal,  there  is  always 
the  touch  of  soul  on  soul. 

Beyond  this  constant  experience  of  humanity’s 
spiritual  universe  as  the  touch  of  soul  on  soul,  it  is 
not  the  humanist’s  task  to  adventure.  His  thought 
is  content  to  remain  within  experience.  He  does 
not  draw  inferences  from  experience  to  something 
supposed  to  be  beyond  it.  He  does  not  attempt 
to  explain  or  interpret  it  by  something  other.  That 
procedure  would  be,  it  seems  to  him,  the  attempt 
to  explain  life  by  something  that  does  not  live.  It 
would  be  to  seek  the  living  among  the  dead.  The 
true  interpretation  of  experience  is  the  deepening 


222  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

of  experience.  To  find  humanity's  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse  in  every  receptive  faith  and  impartive  love, 
and  to  find  that  always  at  the  heart  of  each  experi¬ 
ence,  and  in  the  vital  unfoldings  of  each  experience, 
there  is  the  touch  of  soul  on  soul ;  this  is  the  living 
way  into  the  heart  of  the  God  who  is  able  to  supply 
every  need  of  ours. 

What  do  we  include  in  this  religion  of  the  social 
passion  ?  We  include  of  course  allt  acts  of  faith  in 
men  and  of  love  to  men  which  are  accomplished  in 
the  conviction  of  this  universal  personal  reality; 
and  we  include  all  men  who  act  and  live  in  this 
universal,  personal  conviction.  Yet,  never  to  be 
excluded  from  the  religion  of  the  social  passion  are 
those  impulses  of  human  faith  and  love  in  which 
this  supreme  significance  is  obscure,  or  even  so 
latent  that  it  seems  absent  altogether.  The 
faith  whose  spiritual  universe  is  the  mother's 
smile,  *  the  gift  as  unconscious  of  its  impli¬ 
cations  as  the  bird's  song  is  unconscious  of 
the  universal  heart  of  joy  which  it  expresses, 
these  flow  none  the  less  from  their  source,  which  is 
the  universal  personal,  and  pour  themselves  out 
none  the  less  into  the  social  personal  cause  they 
serve.  They  are  of  the  religious  fellowship  of  the 
social  passion  whose  lives  are  essentially  the  re¬ 
ceptive  human  faith,  the  impartive  human  devotion, 
whatever  their  consciousness  or  unconsciousness  of 
what  that  faith  and  love  enfold.  The  religion  of  the 
social  passion  also  claims  all  human  faiths  and  loves 
even  when  they  are  all  but  overborne  by  selfish¬ 
ness,  brutishness,  insensibility.  Even  through  in- 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION  223 

humanities,  we  penetrate  to  the  human.  The  re¬ 
ligion  of  the  social  passion  claims  any  man  at  any 
moment  when  this  faith  and  love  assert  themselves 
in  him,  though  his  reversions  be  frequent  and  pro¬ 
longed.  We  would  reveal  these  moments  to  him  as 
his  real  humanity,  which  he  must  make  exclusively 
dominant.  This  gospel's  method  is  to  draw  men 
into  acts  of  human  faith  and  love,  so  into  the  uni¬ 
versal  significance,  the  religious  implication  of 
these  acts  of  faith  and  love. 

Even  before  we  attempt  deeper  searchings  and 
clarifyings  of  this  experience,  which  embraces  all 
our  life  that  is  really  human,  we  come  to  the 
supreme  name.  That  from  which  each  personal 
life  flows,  and  upon  which  it  depends,  that  which  is 
the  cause  we  serve,  that  which  is  holy  and  militant 
against  sin,  that  which  works  for  the  supreme  end 
of  its  own  fulfillment  by  holy  love's  energies  of  for¬ 
giveness  and  redemption,  that  which  develops  per¬ 
sonal  life  in  us  all,  and  blends  us  into  its  own  social 
life,  must  be  called  by  the  supreme  name,  holy, 
mysterious,  inexhaustible,  when  we  also  find  every 
experience  of  That  to  be  the  personal  touch  of  soul 
on  soul.  In  God  so  experienced  we  find  nothing 
physical  or  conceptual.  We  do  not  suffer  our 
thought  and  adoration  to  be  degraded  into  the 
former,  or  to  be  dissipated  into  the  latter.  We  con¬ 
fess  the  God  of  the  social  passion.  In  him,  satis¬ 
factions  of  religious  needs  continually  unfold,  and 
disclose  new  discoveries  of  religious  needs,  to  be 
forever  satisfied. 


224  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

§  2 

The  mention  of  a  great  Christian  idea  is  perti¬ 
nent  to  the  recognition  of  the  personal  touch  of 
humanity's  spiritual  universe.  This  is  the  idea  of 
mediation.  It  is  familiar  to  us  in  that  conception 
of  Jesus  as  mediator  between  God  and  man  which 
bids  us  offer  our  prayers  to  God  through  him,  and 
receive  God's  grace  through  him.  It  is  not  the  ex¬ 
clusive  possession  of  Christianity.  To  cite  the  idea 
of  mediation  in  this  connection,  is  not  to  interpret 
the  experience  of  the  personal  touch  of  humanity 
by  something  outside  that  experience,  but  is  simply 
to  dwell  upon  that  which  the  experience  itself  con¬ 
tains. 

The  Christian  idea  of  mediation  must  be  human¬ 
ized  in  two  respects.  It  must  be  extended  to  many 
persons  and  finally  to  all.  Every  man  is  mediator 
who  imparts  his  own  spiritual  life,  for  in  every  such 
gift  the  life  of  the  spiritual  universe  is  communi¬ 
cated.  The  second  emendation  is  that  mediation  is 
not  of  the  superhuman,  but  of  the  human.  Every 
imparter  of  himself  in  the  least  human  kindness 
might  say:  “This  is  universal  love’s  gift  to  you 
through  me;  I  give  to  you  the  human  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse  in  its  touch  of  soul  on  soul." 

The  mediatorship  of  common  men  is  obscured  by 
the  faults  and  frailties  of  common  men.  Their  in¬ 
humanities  check  their  spiritual  impartations.  But 
there  are  great,  pure  souls  of  inexpressible  loveli¬ 
ness  and  power,  whose  every  word  and  look  is  the 
personal  touch  of  God. 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


225 


They  do  not  claim  to  be  “completely  sanctified.” 
They  profess  imperfections  which  those  who  know 
them  best  cannot  see.  Through  this  spiritual 
humility  every  quality  of  them  is  refined,  hallowed, 
perfected.  Few  of  these  crystalline  souls  have  their 
names  blazoned  in  the  records  of  the  world’s 
notorious  achievements.  It  is  better  to  look  for 
them  in  less  ostentatious  places,  more  congenial 
to  their  exquisiteness  of  soul.  In  them  the  human 
ideal  has  been  unconsciously  achieved,  not  as  the 
stationary  goal,  but  as  the  continuous  unfolding  of 
their  luminous  mediation,  their  unprofaned  impart¬ 
ing  of  God.  Happy  is  he  who  has  seen  God  in 
their  eyes,  heard  him  in  their  voices,  felt  his  touch 
in  their  most  gentle,  irresistible  ministries. 

Among  these  best,  one  is  mediator  in  the 
supreme  sense,  since  his  mediatorship  is  most 
deeply  and  extensively  creative.  Nothing  is  added 
to  the  purity  of  Jesus’  mediation  by  the  assumption 
that  every  other  is  impure.  Our  adoration  of  his 
holiness  is  enhanced  when  we  recognize  its  spirit¬ 
ually  creative  power  to  make  others  holy  as  he  is 
holy,  loving  as  he  loved.  That  supreme  sense  of 
mediation  in  Jesus  is  not,  to  the  humanist  of  the 
social  passion,  the  mediation  to  men  of  a  divine 
distinct  from  humanity.  What  shall  bridge  the 
gulf  which  is  assumed  to  be  an  absolute  separation 
when  we  speak  of  a  superhuman  God?  Only  a 
mediator  could  do  that  who  should  be  both  these 
essentially  separate  things,  at  once  human  and 
superhumanly  divine.  But  when  such  a  being  is  sup¬ 
posed,  he  falls  apart  into  two  natures,  the  human 


226  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

and  the  superhumanly  divine,  and  the  attempted 
unity  of  them  seems  to  us  unmeaning  words.  Noth¬ 
ing  is  gained  by  calling  this  difficulty  a  mystery. 
A  contradiction  in  terms  is  not  a  mystery.  The  con¬ 
tradiction  stops  us  short:  the  mystery  leads  us  on 
into  luminous  depths  inexhaustible.  The  human 
Jesus  is,  to  the  religion  of  the  social  passion,  the 
impartive  mediation  of  the  human  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse,  of  the  human  God. 

If  it  were  a  mediation  of  the  human  and  the 
superhuman,  one  mediator  would  be  enough^  if 
there  could  be  any.  With  such  a  conception  of 
things  to  be  mediated,  protestantism  seemed  to  do 
less  badly  than  Catholicism,  when  the  former  re¬ 
jected  the  mediation  of  priest  and  institution,  of 
saints  and  angels;  until  we  recognize  that  the 
catholic  cherished,  very  confusedly,  really  human 
mediations  wherein  is  found  the  human  God.  We 
accept  the  intercession  of  the  saints,  not  all  of  whose 
names  are  in  the  calendar.  To  call  Jesus  the  one 
and  only  mediator,  is  made  impossible  by  the 
mediations  that  are  in  every  gift  of  holy  love,  in 
every  imparting  of  spiritual  life.  Without  the 
recognition  of  this  universally  human  mediation, 
the  mediatorship  of  Jesus  means  nothing.  The 
purpose  of  Jesus  was  to  make  every  man  the  pure 
mediator  of  God’s  grace  and  love  to  every  man. 

So  various  and  inexhaustible  is  that  of  which  we 
are  mediators,  that  not  one  mediation  can  be  spared, 
not  one  must  be  lost.  In  each  personality  is  its  own 
peculiar  mediation.  Each  truly  human  deed  has  its 
own  disclosure,  its  own  gift,  of  the  spiritual  uni- 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


227 


verse.  In  every  human  toil  for  any  human  need 
this  contribtuion  is  at  least  latent.  Mediations  by 
undeveloped  men,  especially  of  children  and  un¬ 
sophisticated  people,  must  be  sought  and  cherished, 
and  even  those  of  evil  men,  as  long  as  there  is  any¬ 
thing  left  in  them  which  is  not  dehumanized.  The 
cause  we  serve  includes  the  gathering  of  all  these 
mediations,  even  of  the  least  and  the  most  disguised, 
from  every  clime,  and  from  every  phase  of  human 
history,  and  strives  for  their  purifying  and  per¬ 
fecting. 

Supreme  among  these  mediations  is  that  impart¬ 
ing  of  the  human  spiritual  universe,  with  touch 
always  personal,  which  is  accomplished  by  sacri- 
fical  love.  On  this  theme  scholastic  dogmatism  and 
recrudescent  pagan  superstition  have  combined  to 
do  their  worst.  That  sacrificial  love  most  imparts 
the  human,  most  reconciles  men  with  the  human 
spiritual  universe,  most  unifies  humanity.  It  is  not 
checked  nor  swerved  by  any  degree  of  suffering. 
Through  suffering  it  realizes  itself  and  achieves  its 
purpose.  Yet  suffering  is  not  its  essential.  It  may 
be  unalloyed  joy,  yet  always  ready  for  any  cost 
of  pain  and  shame.  Suffering  may  be  degradation. 
It  is  that  to  men,  as  long  as  it  remains  an  element 
of  the  physical  order.  Therefore  the  cause  we  serve 
seeks  both  its  removal  and  its  transformation.  It 
is  transformed  when  it  becomes  the  free  offering 
of  redemptive  love.  It  is  impermanent;  the  supreme 
joy  of  love’s  redemptive  conquests  subdues  all  suf¬ 
fering  to  itself.  The  most  holy  symbol  of  the  cross 
must  be  so  received  into  the  heart  of  humanity  that 


228  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

it  is  continually  transfigured  into  redemptive  power 
and  blessedness.  All  deeds  of  sacrificial  love,  among 
which  the  death  of  Jesus  is  supreme,  all  devoted 
souls,  Jesus  preeminent,  are  mediations  of  the 
spiritual  universe  as  sacrificial  love. 

§  3 

Another  Christian  idea  is  pertinent  to  our 
recognition,  that  every  experience  of  receptive  faith 
and  impartive  love  is  the  personal  touch  of  human¬ 
ity’s  concretely  interblended  life,  of  the  human 
spiritual  universe. 

This,  along  with  all  the  great  Christian  ideas, 
is  not  limited  to  Christianity.  The  Christian  re¬ 
ligion  unfolds  them  into  clearer  moral  and  spiritual 
meanings;  for  its  tendency  is  to  fulfill  all  human 
aspirations  in  an  unalloyed  spiritual  life.  The 
Christian  teachings  are  too  great,  too  human,  to  be 
special  revelations.  Nor  have  the  universal  religi¬ 
ous  convictions  reached  their  final  expression  in  that 
which  Christianity  has  as  yet  attained.  These  re¬ 
flections  converge  in  faith  in  the  Holy  Spirit.  The 
religion  of  the  Holy  Spirit  is  the  consummation 
toward  which  all  religions  grope  or  fight  their  way. 
It  is  a  vital,  unfolding  consummation,  not  com¬ 
pletely  achieved  by  Christianity  or  any  other  faith. 
The  religion  of  the  social  passion  desires  to  be  noth¬ 
ing  more,  and  nothing  less,  than  the  expression  of 
the  universal  aspiration,  which  is  the  Christian 
aspiration.  It  is  the  Holy  Spirit  to  which  it  aspires. 
This  is  the  God  which  it  confesses,  finding  him 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  ,SOCIAL  PASSION 


229 


in  the  personal  touch  of  humanity’s  interblended 
life,  of  humanity’s  spiritual  universe.* 

It  is  said  frequently :  “I  believe  that  God  is  both 
immanent  and  transcendent.”  The  metaphysical 
difficulties  involved  in  this  statement  are  many  and 
great.  It  is  not  our  present  task  to  discuss  them. 
The  persistence  of  the  latter  part  of  the  statement 
is  mainly  due  to  one  vital  reason,  whatever  sub¬ 
sidiary  reasons  there  may  be.  It  is  because  devout 
men  recognize  that  religious  needs  are  satisfied  only 
by  faith  in  the  personal  God,  and  they  fear  lest 
the  immanent  God  may  not  satisfy  their  needs.  The 
spiritual  interpretation  of  humanism  is  convinced 
that  the  Holy  Spirit  of  humanity  gives  that  satis¬ 
faction. 

Personal  is  the  touch  of  the  indwelling  human 
God  in  every  human  faith  and  love.  Just  that  ex¬ 
perience  of  the  divine  personality  gives  us  the  per¬ 
sonal  divine  we  need.  And  this  experience  of  the 
divine  personality  keeps  us  always  close  to  human 
life.  It  does  not  exist  apart  from  our  human  joys 
and  sorrows,  conflicts  and  victories,  dependencies 
and  affections,  sharings  with  every  man  of  the 
humanity  by  which  he  is  our  brotherman.  To  seek 
a  personal  God  outside  this  human  is  to  diminish, 
is  implicitly  to  lose  God’s  social  personality  and  our 
own.  It  is  helpful  and  inevitable  that  our  thought 
and  faith  and  love  should  sometimes  dwell  upon 
our  sharings  of  that  personal,  social,  spiritual  unity, 
and  sometimes  stress  that  unity  which  we  share. 

♦This  religious  consciousness  does  not  seem  to  me  to  be  involved 
in  the  recent  interesting  discussions  concerning  the  conception 
the  inclusion  of  human  persons  in  a  supreme  being. 


230  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

When  the  latter  alternation  of  the  one  experience  is 
present  to  us,  we  have  everything  that  the  devout 
soul  could  ask  of  a  transcendent  deity,  with  the 
removal  of  many  obstacles  to  thought  and  faith  and 
love. 

In  the  alternation  there  is  a  danger  against 
which  we  must  ever  be  on  our  guard.  It  is  that 
we  may  be  drawn  away  from  our  fellowmen  and 
from  our  common  life  of  faith  in  them  and  love  to 
them,  and  away  from  the  common  tasks  in  which 
that  faith  and  love  are  realized. 

§  4 

What  is  prayer  to  the  Holy  Spirit  of  humanity? 
No  spiritual  thought  can  be  accepted  as  serviceable 
that  fails  to  deepen  and  strengthen  the  life  of 
prayer.  And  prayer,  ever  broadening,  intensifying, 
not  separating  itself  from  any  part  of  life,  but 
penetrating,  energizing  all,  must  be  prayer  as  the 
little  child  knows  it,  and  as  its  compulsions  grasp 
us  at  all  times  of  our  joys  with  their  thankfulness, 
our  sorrows  with  their  consolations,  our  repentance 
with  its  atoning  forgiveness,  our  restlessness  calmed 
with  the  supreme  repose,  our  aspirations  which  be¬ 
come  realizations  by  the  power  of  prayer.  Can 
the  religion  of  the  social  passion  make  more  vital 
within  us  the  prayer-life  of  Jesus?  Can  it  lead  us 
deeper  into  the  fellowship  of  the  deathless  words: 
Father,  hallowed  be  thy  name,  thy  kingdom  come; 
Father,  if  it  be  possible,  let  this  cup  pass  from  me. 
nevertheless  not  as  I  will,  but  as  thou  wilt ;  Father, 
into  thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit?  Can  we  gain 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


231 


his  confidence  that  our  prayer  is  heard  and  an¬ 
swered  ? 

Prayer  to  the  Holy  Spirit  of  humanity  is  not 
directed  to  a  God  of  physical  power.  It  is  not  neces¬ 
sary  to  repeat  humanism’s  reasons  for  rejecting 
the  imputation  of  physical  attributes  to  deity.  But 
may  there  be  mentioned  once  more  the  unspeakable 
relief  from  the  anguish  of  unanswered  prayer  to  a 
physical  omnipotence,  blind,  deaf,  insensible,  as  the 
physical  must  be.  Since  we  permit  no  intrusion  of 
the  physical  into  our  thought  of  the  God  to  whom 
we  pray,  so  we  keep  the  physical  out  of  our  prayers. 
We  do  not  pray  for  rain  or  fair  weather,  or  for 
anything  to  affect  the  processes  of  things.  We  do 
not  ask  any  physical  protection  against  the  out¬ 
rages  which  inhumanity  may  inflict  upon  us,  though 
we  pray  that  our  enemies  may  be  brought  to  re¬ 
pentance  and  a  better  mind.  We  pray  for  strength 
of  mind  and  soul  to  overcome  the  physical,  and  to 
accomplish  our  tasks  unto  the  triumph  of  the  cause 
we  serve.  This  apparent  limitation  does  not 
separate  him  to  whom  we  pray  from  any  ills  that 
beset  us,  but  relies  on  the  sympathy  which  is  an 
essential  of  the  help  he  gives  for  enduring  them,  for 
achieving  in  and  from  and  against  the  world 
humanity’s  one  precious  possession,  its  own  soul. 
If  this  exclusion  of  the  physical  from  our  prayer 
seems  too  hard  for  our  capacity  of  suffering,  and 
we  pray  with  strong  crying  and  tears  that  the  cup 
may  pass  from  us,  it  will  not  pass  except  we  drink 
it,  but  we  shall  be  empowered  to  have  his  will  done 
in  us;  and  that  will  is  the  victory  of  the  devoted 


232  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

soul,  and  shall  be  a  part  in  humanity's  great  con¬ 
flict,  unto  the  triumph  of  the  cause  we  serve. 

This  prayer  is  not  separated  in  any  wise  from 
our  receptive  faith  in  our  fellowmen,  and  our  im- 
partive  love  to  them.  Prayer  is  the  concentration 
of  this  faith  and  love.  Whenever  my  faith  in  a 
fellowman  receives  from  him  an  essential  of  my 
own  life,  then  I  am  praying  to  him.  If  I  were  not 
praying  to  him  I  would  not  be  praying  to  God.  So 
every  impartive  love  to  our  fellowmen  is  the  prayer 
which  is  the  giving  of  ourselves.  Whatever  belongs 
to  faith  and  love  is,  as  we  have  seen,  devoted  to 
human  beings,  in  their  interblended  life,  in  their 
mediation  of  the  spiritual  universe.  In  faith  and 
love  are  included  all  elements  and  aspects  of  prayer, 
such  as  contrition,  thanksgiving,  supplication,  con¬ 
secration.  These  prayers  are  directed  to  those 
against  whom  we  have  sinned,  beseeching  their  for¬ 
giveness,  which  is  our  restoration  to  them ;  to  those 
to  whom  we  are  grateful  for  our  spiritual  life;  to 
those  from  whom  we  long  to  receive  ourselves ;  and, 
in  prayer's  highest  range,  to  those  to  whom  we 
sacrificially  impart  ourselves.  This  prayer  is 
essentially  social.  It  is  with  others  and  for  others, 
even  as  our  life  is,  which  has  its  concentrations 
there. 

In  these  prayers  to  them  we  pray  to  the  one 
Holy  Spirit  of  them  all,  for  we  are  praying  to  the 
spiritual  universe  of  humanity's  interblended  life. 
From  that  inexhaustible  reservoir  of  spiritual 
power,  from  all  the  heroisms,  nobilities  that  con¬ 
tribute  to  it,  we  receive  power  into  our  own  souls. 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


233 


Unto  all  that  humanity  can  ever  become  we  devote 
ourselves  in  prayer,  and  the  supreme  strength  is 
ours  in  this  devotion.  All  the  blendings  of  human 
excellence  from  which  we  receive  ourselves,  and  to 
which  we  give  ourselves,  are  ours  when  we  pray. 
When,  in  our  concentrations  of  human  faiths  and 
loves,  we  are  conscious  of  the  Holy  Spirit  who  is 
humanity’s  spiritual  universe  in  personal  touch 
upon  our  souls,  then  prayer  attains  life’s  most 
august  meaning.  But  there  is  prayer  in  every  re¬ 
ceptive  faith  and  every  impartive  love,  however 
latent  may  be  that  deeper  consciousness. 

The  times  when  that  uniting  consciousness  is  deep 
and  intense,  minister  most  effectively  to  our  life  of 
faith  and  love  to  our  fellowmen.  Such  hours  or 
moments  must  not  be  separations  from  the  simple 
humanness  of  life.  When  prayer  draws  our  hearts 
away  from  men,  we  have  then  ceased  to  pray,  and 
it  is  time  to  go  out  to  receive  from  men  and  to  give 
to  men,  in  the  prayer  life  of  common  faiths  and 
loves.  The  prayer  of  the  mystic  who  would  lose 
all  action  in  God,  has  no  place  in  the  religion  of  the 
social  passion.  It  has  no  place  in  our  devotion  to 
the  cause  we  serve.  Our  religion  has  a  deeper 
mysticism,  which  is  social,  human. 

We  pray  to  all  men  in  our  human  trusts  and  loves. 
This  prayer  is  deepest  and  clearest  when  offered  to 
those  in  whom  humanity  is  most  realized.  Revered 
among  them  are  the  holy  and  loving  whose  mortal 
faces  we  shall  see  no  more,  who  unite  us  with  the 
spiritual  universe  which  extends  beyond  this  earth. 
Supreme  among  these  is  he  in  whose  name  we  have 


234  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

learned  to  pray.  And  when  we  pray  to  them,  trust¬ 
ing  and  loving  them  beyond  all  mortal  scope,  we 
feel  most  reverently,  transformingly,  the  innermost 
communion  of  the  Holy  Spirit  of  humanity. 

The  prayer  life  of  Jesus  is  the  guidance  of  our 
prayer.  Does  the  religion  of  the  social  passion 
follow  his  life  of  prayer?  An  obvious  consideration 
here  is  that  he  prayed  saying  “Father,”  and  thus 
he  taught  his  disciples  to  pray. 

The  reverent  discrimination  must  be  made  be¬ 
tween  the  conceptions  which  he  inherited,  or  de¬ 
rived  from  his  time,  and  those  convictions  which 
were  essential  riches  of  his  own  soul.  This  dis¬ 
tinction  has  been  applied  in  a  previous  chapter 
to  the  significance  of  Jesus'  hope.  The  Jewish 
theology  included  conceptions  of  deity  which  are 
not  in  the  religion  of  the  social  passion.  It  was  not 
his  way  to  criticise  his  doctrinal  inheritance,  except 
as  it  clashed  with  his  spiritual  apprehensions.  The 
personal,  spiritual  was  predominant  in  Jesus'  filial 
faith,  and  was  pervasive  of  his  prayer.  That  per¬ 
sonal,  spiritual  it  is  our  privilege  to  follow,  none 
the  less  when  it  removes  some  of  his  inheritances. 
Giving  up  his  infallible  authority,  we  gain  accumu¬ 
lating  riches  from  his  soul,  and  nothing  in  his 
spiritual  leadership  is  compromised. 

We  do  not  depart  from  the  religious  conscious¬ 
ness  of  Jesus,  when  we  identify  the  Father  to  whom 
he  prayed,  with  the  Holy  Spirit  as  spiritual  father¬ 
hood.  We  are  then  not  in  the  realm  of  trinitarian 
distinctions,  any  more  than  Jesus  was.  His  word, 
Father,  differs  from  the  credal  significance  of  that 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


235 


name.  It  does  not  differ  from  that  faith  in  the 
spiritual  God  to  which  the  religious  consciousness 
of  the  world  ever  tends.  Rather  does  his  name, 
Father,  express  and  fulfill  that  consciousness. 

Alien  to  him  was  the  church’s  early  intrusion  of 
physical  attributes  into  faith  in  the  Father.  The 
apostles’  creed,  as  it  is  called,  confessing  faith  in 
the  Father,  continues  with  the  words,  “Almighty, 
maker  of  heaven  and  earth.”  There  is  an  evident 
loss  of  the  name’s  spiritual  greatness  and  tender¬ 
ness.  That  creed  is  exchanging  the  spiritual  for 
the  physical.  A  similar  loss  of  the  spiritual  was 
betrayed  by  the  addition  of  the  words,  “who  art  in 
heaven,”  in  Jesus’  great  prayer.  The  version  of 
the  Lord’s  prayer  which  is  nearest  his  utterance 
begins,  “Father,”  with  no  additional  word  of  ad¬ 
dress.  Nor  did  his  prayer  close  with  the  less  than 
purely  spiritual  ascription,  “For  thine  is  the  king¬ 
dom,  and  the  power,  and  the  glory,  forever.  Amen.” 
The  first  of  these  amplifications  casts  suspicion  upon 
the  authenticity  of  the  phrase,  “Your  Father  who 
is  in  heaven,”  in  reports  of  Jesus’  teaching.  At  the 
least,  there  is  no  proof  that  the  predominant  con¬ 
sciousness  of  Jesus  was  other  than  that  of  the 
spiritual  fatherhood,  and  this  consciousness  is  at¬ 
tested  by  the  general  tenor  of  Jesus’  teachings,  and 
by  the  whole  devotion  of  his  life.  It  is  to  this 
spiritual  fatherhood  that  the  religion  of  the  social 
passion  strives  to  be  faithful,  in  its  worship  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  of  humanity. 

The  long-continued  solitudes  of  Jesus’  prayers 
were  for  the  unity  of  his  life’s  devotion.  Devout 


236  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

scholars  have  traced  that  unity  in  his  attainment 
of  the  greatest  decisions  of  his  ministry,  by  his 
especially  marked  times  of  prayer.  An  example 
is  his  retirement  from  his  work  in  Galilee  to  learn 
among  the  mountains,  with  his  Father,  that  to 
acomplish  his  redemptive  task  he  must  go  to  Jeru¬ 
salem  to  be  crucified.  Gethsemane  is  the  most 
tremendous  instance.  We,  who  ask  him  to  teach 
us  to  pray,  advance  in  the  supreme  human  devotion, 
by  escaping  in  prayer’s  most  illuminative  hours 
from  the  confusions  of  our  tasks,  that  we  may  gain 
whole  views  of  them  and  of  the  cause  we  serve,  and 
that  we  may  become  more  deeply  conscious  of  what 
that  is  which  unifies  and  energizes  them,  recogniz¬ 
ing  who  he  is  whose  personal  touch  we  feel  in  every 
touch  of  our  fellowmen.  We  do  not  leave  these 
tasks,  and  those  for  whom  they  are  performed,  out¬ 
side  our  soul’s  inmost  shrine.  They  are  never  more 
present  to  us  than  when  we  thus  unify,  enlarge,  and 
hallow  the  tasks,  and  learn  to  love  more  deeply 
those  whom  we  serve.  And  this  consciousness  we 
take  back  into  every  detail  of  our  service,  so  fusing, 
in  Jesus’  way,  every  detail  of  life  into  one  faith  and 
love. 

§  5 

Modified  from  traditional  conceptions  is  our  faith 
in  the  God  who  is  on  our  side,  faith  in  the  spiritual 
universe  in  which  we  are  embattled.  Men  have 
always  felt  the  need  of  favorable  powers.  This  is 
one  of  the  sources  of  the  religious  consciousness, 
and  has  often  been  presented  as  the  principal  one. 
In  this  conscious  need  the  savage  cajoles  magical 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


237 


assistance  against  tiger  and  serpent,  famine  and 
pestilence.  In  this  confidence  the  Hebrew  wisdom 
literature  promised  length  of  prosperous  days  to 
those  who  trust  in  Jehovah.  Less  ethical  are  they 
who  say,  “Whatever  is,  is  right,”  and  philosophies 
which  find  all  things  reconciled  in  the  absolute.  It 
is  natural  for  men  to  indulge  such  a  dream,  for  the 
realities  of  life  and  death  are  so  stern.  But  they 
lose  too  much  of  that  ministering  sympathy  with 
human  sorrow,  without  which  life  is  poor  indeed. 
Such  a  faith  does  not  make  for  manliness,  and  the 
goods  it  desires  are  unworthy  of  the  human  soul. 

Man  has  a  warfare  upon  the  earth,  and  against 
powers  which  exceed  the  earth.  Nor  does  the  con¬ 
flict  end  with  life's  mortal  phase.  There  are  no 
superhuman  powers  upon  which  we  can  depend  for 
victory.  Success  is  not  assured  by  any  divine  de¬ 
cree,  any  overrulings  by  an  invincible  providence. 
The  conflict  is  real  because  real  is  the  possibility 
of  defeat.  Every  soul  bears  responsibility  for  the 
outcome  and  for  every  step  of  the  advance.  Loss 
is  loss.  Disaster  is  disaster.  Ruin  is  ruin.  There 
are  fearful  reverses,  and  there  is  no  omnipotent 
philanthropist  to  make  good  the  misery  and  waste. 

Yet  the  confidence  of  the  religion  of  the  social 
passion  is  more  assured  than  the  trust  of  one  who 
falls  back  upon  any  superhuman  deity.  Its  faith  is 
in  the  inherent  powers  of  humanity's  spiritual  uni¬ 
verse,  which  are  sufficient  to  overcome.  And  here 
is  peace  deeper  than  is  known  by  those  whom  the 
belief  in  an  absolute  omnipotence  lulls  to  sleep.  This 
peace  cannot  be  expected  to  discharge  us  from  the 


238  THE  REUGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

strife,  here  or  in  any  world.  There  are  vast  realiza¬ 
tions  of  humanity  beyond  this  mortal  phase,  and  in 
their  achievement  redemptive  forces  have  many 
obstacles  to  overcome.  We  cannot  expect  a  throne 
of  complete  victory,  nor  to  lay  down  the  weapons 
of  our  warfare  and  to  take  up  golden  harps,  nor  to 
exchange  action  for  any  contemplation  that  is  not 
a  power  for  action.  Yet  in  all  these  things,  not 
apart  from  them,  is  the  sufficient  peace,  anticipated 
in  the  Greek  ideal  of  reposeful  mastery,  deepening 
with  every  extension  of  love's  warfare  to  subdue  all 
things  to  itself.  Peace  is  of  our  advancing  spiritual 
universe  in  which  we  have  confidence;  it  is  of  the 
toiling  and  striving  God  in  whom  we  trust. 

Deep  and  mighty  is  our  thanksgiving  unto  him 
for  all  his  benefits.  He  is  no  Dives  of  a  God  whose 
giving  costs  him  nothing,  since  it  is  only  the  falling 
of  crumbs  from  a  rich  man's  table.  In  all  our 
afflictions  he  is  afflicted.  All  our  toils  are  his.  It 
is  not  a  compassion  that  is  lost  in  an  infinity  of 
blessedness.  It  is  a  sympathy  that  is  one  with  all 
human  suffering  and  achievement.  God  rejoices 
with  them  that  rejoice,  and  weeps  with  them  that 
weep.  All  his  blessedness  is  within  the  life  of 
humanity.  In  Jesus  this  heroic  compassion  of  love 
is  realized,  by  the  giving  of  self  to  the  uttermost, 
for  victory  at  so  great  a  cost.  Not  in  Jesus  alone, 
but  in  every  pressing  forward  of  humanity  with 
bleeding  feet,  is  our  human  God.  His  are  the  strife 
and  the  victory,  and  the  gentleness  and  holiness 
and  love  which  are  the  militant  blessedness  through 
all. 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


239 


Our  devotion  to  God  is  no  empty  service,  unneces¬ 
sary  to  a  being  that  already  possesses  all  things. 
Service  is  chilled  to  the  heart  when  there  is  found 
to  be  no  need  of  it.  But  whatever  we  do  for  our 
fellowmen,  we  do  for  the  unfolding  realization  of 
the  supreme  life.  God  has  need  of  us.  He  has 
need  of  the  utmost  sacrificial  development  of  every 
soul.  Every  advance  of  any  man  is  his  advance. 
Every  unfolding  of  human  powers  is  his  increase. 
In  every  ministering  he  is  ministered  unto,  that 
his  passion  to  minister  may  be  accomplished.  Every 
saving  of  life  by  losing  it  is  his  gain.  We  do  not 
call  him  complete,  for  completeness  can  receive  no 
addition.  We  do  not  call  him  absolutely  blessed, 
for  such  blessedness  could  not  be  deepened  by  any 
love  of  ours.  We  call  him  altogether  holy,  for  he 
is  altogether  human. 

There  is  no  requirement  of  the  religious  con¬ 
sciousness  more  profound  than  this,  that  there  must 
be  the  life  of  God  in  the  soul  of  man.  Every  genuine 
religious  impulse  turns  toward  this,  back  from  every 
separative  way.  But  if  this  is  but  an  individualistic 
aspiration,  it  runs  into  quietism  or  ecstatic  mystic¬ 
ism,  which  are  defeated  by  the  world,  for  they  flee 
from  the  world;  and  they  are  sundered  from  hu¬ 
manity's  spiritual  universe,  where  God  is.  Or  that 
supreme  impulse  may  limit  itself  to  a  community, 
which,  boasting  its  possession  of  God,  confesses  a 
God  no  greater  than  itself.  The  social  passion  for 
the  concrete  humanity  of  interblended  souls  reveals 
God  in  ones  own  soul. 

Everything  normally  human  enters  into  this  life, 


240  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

— not  sin,  for  that  is  unhuman.  The  social  passion 
fulfills  the  requirement  of  a  life  that  is  one,  in  its 
inclusion  and  harmony  of  all  the  elements  of  life. 
In  its  task  of  subordinating  the  physical  to  itself  is 
included  the  impulse  to  know  the  physical,  and  to 
exploit  it  thoroughly  for  human  ends.  All  is  present 
there  that  the  age  of  physical  science  has  gained, 
and  all  that  the  developments  of  physical  science 
have  to  gain.  Humanity's  socially  interblended  life 
demands  all  that  social  experience  may  yield  from 
co-operations  of  men,  in  government,  in  industry,  in 
united  efforts  to  make  all  human  activities  and  re¬ 
lations  instruments  of  the  cause  we  serve,  and  to 
that  cause  belongs  the  supreme  name. 

When  it  is  said  in  disparagement  of  our  social 
efforts  to  normalize  human  conditions,  relations, 
and  organizations,  that  no  improvement  in  these 
things  can  create  the  supreme  good  for  a  single 
soul,  it  is  not  necessary  for  us  to  apologize  for  this 
work  as  subordinate  and  preliminary.  Our  efforts 
are  to  make  every  relation  of  man  to  man  the  im- 
partation  of  life  to  life,  the  perfecting  of  personal¬ 
ities  in  their  life  together.  This  is  the  directive 
principle  of  all  social  science.  It  demands  the  ut¬ 
most  of  information,  wisdom,  and  ability,  which  are 
the  energizings  of  love.  It  arouses  every  power 
within  us  against  every  unrighteousness,  every  in¬ 
equality  in  mens'  work  together,  against  everything 
divisive  and  repressive  in  any  social  organization, 
political,  industrial,  or  whatever.  It  labors  to  set 
free  all  human  powers  in  these  mutual  ministries, 
for  the  sake  of  soul.  It  aims  to  develop  all  con- 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


241 


eertecf  tasks  to  their  utmost  efficiency  for  the  per¬ 
fecting  of  the  personal,  social,  divine  love-life  of 
all  mankind. 

In  this  religion  we  include  the  heritage  of  the 
past,  that  great  flood  of  human  life  whose  vital 
elements  we  continually  renew.  The  man  of  the 
social  passion  recognizes  in  every  smile  and  every 
sigh,  in  every  festival  and  day  of  grief,  in  all  men 
everywhere,  now  and  always,  the  personal  touch 
of  the  Holy  Spirit  of  humanity.  And  all  these  are 
dynamic,  not  static,  ever  progressive,  never  sta¬ 
tionary.  They  sweep  on  to  their  fulfillments,  and 
these  are  spiritual  from  more  to  more.  Every 
element  of  humanity  realizes  itself  in  spiritual  life, 
which  is  the  overcoming  of  the  world  and  the  un¬ 
folding  of  the  human. 


§  6 

The  religion  of  the  social  passion  claims  the 
Christian  name.  None  the  less  does  this  faith  seek 
to  be  universally  human.  Religion  is  the  growth 
of  all  the  history  of  humanity,  and  the  religious 
consciousness  has  to  appropriate  the  unfoldings  of 
religion  in  that  great  life  of  humanity.  Of  the  uni¬ 
versal  human,  Christianity  is  the  highest  expres¬ 
sion,  with  far  mightier  demands  when  thus  esti¬ 
mated  than  when  acclaimed  as  a  new  divine 
announcement  from  the  sky.  And  Christianity  is 
not  static,  but  dynamic.  It  grows  with  the  advances 
of  each  new  time.  Yet  no  time  changes  it  into 
something  different,  but  rather  reveals  its  enduring 
spirit,  its  unfolding  life.  Today  its  social  implica- 


242  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

tions  are  surging  to  the  front,  and  are  revealing 
Christianity’s  very  heart.  In  them  the  purpose 
of  its  incomparable  founder  is  coming  to  its  own. 
In  them  is  given  the  answer  to  the  question :  What 
is  the  nature  of  Christianty?  By  the  religion  of 
the  social  passion  we  mean  the  universal  religion, 
we  mean  Christianity  human,  social,  spiritual. 

What  is  the  attitude  of  the  universal  Christianity 
of  the  social  passion  toward  the  Christian  church, 
the  Christian  creeds,  and  the  supreme  prophet  of 
Christianity,  Jesus? 

Those  who  hold  the  human  faith  cannot  say,  “I 
believe  in  the  holy  catholic  church,”  if  that  con¬ 
fession  acknowledges  the  church  as  a  peculiarly 
divine  institution,  deriving  sanction  and  validity 
from  above  our  common  human  life,  or  with  efficacy 
in  its  sacraments  beyond  the  memories,  loves,  and 
purposes  which  they  renew,  or  with  any  authority 
over  the  thought  and  life  of  men.  Still  less  can  we 
acknowledge  the  church  as  a  peculiarly  divine  insti¬ 
tution,  if  we  deprive  it  of  the  title  “catholic,”  which 
may  take  the  ascription  “holy”  along  with  it.  Such 
faith  in  a  sect,  or  an  aggregation  of  sects,  loses  the 
arguments  advanced  by  a  church  with  the  catholic 
consciousness — or  pretension.  Significant  is  the 
fact,  which  no  untrammeled  modern  scholarship 
questions,  that  there  is  no  mention  of  the  church  in 
any  authentic  saying  of  Jesus. 

It  is  not  to  the  church  but  to  humanity  that  we 
owe  the  supreme  devotion.  As  far  as  the  church 
is  against  humanity,  we  are  against  the  church. 
Yet  in  this  uncompromising  decision  there  is  in- 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


24.1 


volved  the  recognition  of  the  value  of  the  church  for 
humanity,  and  of  the  claim  of  the  church  upon  all 
who  love  men.  For  as  human  interests  of  every 
kind  are  furthered  by  social  combinations,  so  there 
is  required  the  social  combination  for  the  further- 
ence  of  humanity’s  spiritual  consciousness,  its  in¬ 
clusive  aim,  its  very  soul.  The  church,  deepening 
and  clarifying  this  consciousness  in  all  its  worship, 
in  all  its  life,  relating  to  this  supreme  purpose  all 
that  men  do  and  suffer,  summoning  every  human 
interest  and  institution  to  fulfill  this  aim,  so  unify¬ 
ing  all  human  affairs,  and  relating  all  parts  of 
human  life  to  one  another,  has  an  indispensable 
function  in  the  service  of  humanity.  In  this  service 
the  church  is  wholly  and  universally  religious.  It 
is  the  church  of  Christ.  We  are  prepared  to  be 
very  patient  with  all  remainders  of  opposition,  in 
the  church,  to  the  cause  we  serve.  Yet  never,  in  any 
wise,  will  we  sacrifice  the  social  passion  to  the 
church,  whose  function  is  to  foster  that  passion’s 
deepest,  most  spiritual,  most  human  meaning.  It 
is  a  church  of  complete  spiritual  freedom,  in  which 
“no  accent  of  the  Holy  Ghost  is  ever  lost.”  Unity 
and  catholicity  are  in  the  spiritual  purpose. 

To  the  humanist,  the  historic  creeds  are  less  con¬ 
genial  than  the  church,  though  he  heartily  recog¬ 
nizes  their  faithfulness  to  Christianity’s  emphasis 
upon  redemption,  and  their  loyalty  to  Jesus  the  re¬ 
deemer.  His  chief  objection  to  them  is  that  they 
presuppose  a  separation  of  nature  between  God  and 
man,  confirmed  by  their  attempts  to  bridge  that 
separation.  Certain  liberal  statements  which  accept 


244  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

that  separateness,  and  make  no  attempt  to  bridge 
it,  seem  to  us  to  have  no  superiority  over  the  old 
creeds.  The  least  that  we  can  ask  is  that  the 
church's  attitude  toward  the  historic  creeds  shall  be 
that  of  complete  freedom,  for  two  reasons,  among 
others,  which  should  appeal  to  all  earnest  men.  One 
is,  that  they  were  formed  without  sufficient  appre¬ 
ciation  of  the  social  purpose  of  Jesus.  The  other 
is,  that  we  include  as  instruments  or  realizations 
of  that  social  purpose,  everything  that  science  dis¬ 
covers  and  the  progress  of  humanity  achieves.  This 
freedom  best  preserves  that  which  is  of  abiding 
value  in  the  historic  creeds. 

Concerning  the  place  of  Jesus  in  the  religion  of 
the  social  passion — the  reader  is  referred  especially 
to  the  fifth  chapter.  The  world,  in  all  its  affairs, 
must  believe  in  him  or  perish.  Never  was  the  issue 
more  clear  and  pregnant  than  it  is  today,  between 
unchristianized  principles,  utterly  inadequate  and 
inapplicable  to  our  civilization's  continuing  emer¬ 
gencies,  and  the  leadership  of  Jesus,  in  which  alone 
our  civilization  has  any  hope.  Whether  one  nation 
or  another,  or  one  class,  or  one  interest,  is  justified, 
in  the  light  of  those  principles,  in  its  procedures 
against  another,  is  a  question  without  meaning,  for 
there  is  no  justification  by  those  principles.  It 
would  be  just  as  sane  to  be  guided  by  despotic  or 
feudal  principles. 

The  religion  of  the  social  passion  cannot  share 
the  traditional  christology.  Though  we  listen 
reverently  to  every  ascription  of  praise  to  Jesus, 
because  its  intent  is  to  honor  him,  yet  our  voices 


THE  GOD  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


245 


cannot  join  in  those  ascriptions,  which,  assuming 
the  separation  of  God  and  man,  seek  to  exalt  Jesus 
above  the  humanity  which  is  the  divine  life.  We 
cannot  attribute  two  natures  to  Jesus,  a  divine  and 
a  human,  nor  dismiss  him  to  a  trinity  above  the 
human.  Even  less  satisfactory  is  the  relegation  of 
him  to  a  humanity  considered  essentially  separate 
from  the  divine.  Since  God  is  human,  these  reserva¬ 
tions  are  not  a  denial  of  the  divinity  of  Jesus,  though 
the  traditional  connotations  of  that  phrase  make 
it  of  doubtful  value. 

Reverently  studying  Jesus  as  human,  and  apply¬ 
ing  human  tests,  we  cannot  impute  to  him  infallible 
authority  even  in  religious  matters.  Limitations  in 
Jesus’  thought  are  evident,  though  each  of  them 
testifies  to  the  vast  scope  and  depth  of  the  mind 
of  the  supreme  teacher.  Such  an  authority  would 
give  men  nothing  of  vital  worth,  and  would  take 
away  the  essential  of  his  life-task  and  ours.  The 
true  teacher  is  the  leader  of  his  disciples’  search  for 
truth  and  good.  Jesus’  leadership  of  the  search 
does  not  impair  his  wisdom,  redemptive  power. 

The  Jesus  of  whom  we  speak  is  the  historic  Jesus. 
It  is  only  to  symbolists  that  he  is  only  a  symbol.  The 
personal,  historic  power  of  Jesus  is  the  power  of 
an  historic  person.  To  men  who  live  in  the  life 
of  men,  the  attempt  to  disprove  his  historicity  has 
been  of  value,  in  relieving  us  of  the  Christ  of  tradi¬ 
tional  theology,  rendering  clearer  to  our  appre¬ 
hension  the  Jesus  who  is  essential  to  the  historic 
stream  of  human  life.  There  is  no  space  in  this 
writing  for  the  detailed  unfolding  of  the  historic 


246  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 

argument.  It  is  sufficient  to  read  the  historic 
gospels  (the  fourth  gospel  has  many  invaluable 
appreciations  of  the  significance  of  the  history) 
eliminating  from  the  picture  the  intrusions  of 
Jewish  and  syncretistic  conceptions,  and  to  estimate 
vitally,  historically,  the  historic  impression.  This 
is  done  unconsciously  by  unlearned  men  who  re¬ 
spond  to  the  inmost  spirit  of  Jesus.  The  postulate 
that  Jesus  is  an  historic  personality,  working  ever 
upon  men  with  personal  power,  is  continuously, 
vindicated  by  deepening  spiritual  results  in  many 
lives,  and  in  the  interblended  life  of  humanity. 

All  that  we  may  try  to  say  of  holy  humanity,  of 
receptive  faith  and  impartive  love,  is  incomparably 
surpassed  in  our  purely  human  Lord  and  Saviour. 
Jesus  Christ.  In  his  mediation  of  the  universal 
human  is  felt  supremely  the  personal  touch  of  the 
Holy  Spirit  of  humanity,  soul  on  soul.  When  we 
find  exquisite  spiritual  holiness  and  redemptive  love 
in  souls  in  whom  there  is  no  intrusion  of  the  un¬ 
human,  they  are  witnesses  to  the  glory  of  Jesus, 
for  their  lives  are  from  him  and  in  him.  The 
supreme  witness  to  his  glory  and  power  is  hu¬ 
manity’s  spiritual  universe. 

§7 

The  detailed  applications,  which  are  the  practical 
interpretations  of  the  religion  of  the  social  passion, 
must  be  passed  over  to  specialists  in  various  fields, 
and  to  those  who,  with  them,  in  extensive  or  in 
lowly  ministry,  work  out  the  inexhaustible  problems 
of  humanity.  Because  spiritual  ends  are  purely 


THE  GO  13  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


247 


human,  the  religion  of  the  social  passion  can  be 
applied  directly  in  every  instance;  and  all  knowl¬ 
edge,  skill,  practical  experience,  administrative 
talent,  find  immediate  and  progressive  spiritual, 
human  efficiences.  The  social  process  is  the  purely 
human  interblending  of  life  with  life,  the  removal 
of  every  unhuman  separation  between  man  and 
man,  class  and  class  (until  the  present  disruptive 
meanings  of  that  word  disappear),  nation  and 
nation,  race  and  race. 

For  this  interblending,  fulfilling  life,  the  mighty 
must  descend  from  their  seats,  to  exalt  them  of  low 
degree.  Jesus’  preference  for  the  last  and  the  least 
must  revolutionize  our  social  order.  Many  palaces 
must  be  demolished  or  socialized,  that  hovels  may 
be  reconstructed  into  homes.  Upon  every  destruc¬ 
tive  wastefulness,  separative  self-indulgence,  pomp 
of  pride,  must  be  passed  the  same  condemnation  as 
upon  the  more  obviously  brutal  irruptions  of  the 
unhuman.  Whatever  a  man  has,  either  through 
favoring  fortune,  or  exceptional  talent,  or  long  toil, 
he  holds  only  that  he  may  most  effectively  impart 
it,  together  with  his  own  disciplined,  enriched  soul. 
Not  only  must  equal  and  supreme  opportunity  and 
instruments  of  opportunity  be  opened  to  every 
human  being  of  every  race,  of  every  clime,  begin¬ 
ning  with  the  last  and  least;  but  to  every  man  must 
be  given  also  the  devotions  of  the  social  passion, 
urgent,  patient,  impartive  of  soul,  inspiring  the 
fulfillment  of  the  equal  and  supreme  opportunity, 
unto  the  perfecting  of  humanity’s  interblended  life, 
unto  the  fulfillment  of  the  cause  we  serve.  The  re- 


248  THE  RELIGION  OF  THE  SOCIAL  PASSION 


demptive  love  which  welcomes  this  tasK  is  both 
heroic  and  compassionate  unto  the  uttermost. 

The  social  passion  is  not  one  impulse  among 
others,  but  is  the  whole  of  the  real  human  life.  Unto 
this  converges  every  constituent  of  our  being,  and 
is  fulfilled  in  this  forevermore.  This  is  the  true  God 
and  eternal  life.  God  is  love :  and  he  that  dwelleth 
in  love  dwelleth  in  God,  and  God  in  him. 


